To Prison
by Vol lady
Summary: AU - for readers who asked me to write something like this. Jarrod goes to prison for his crimes at Rimfire. Rating reflects some violence and vile prison conditions.
1. Chapter 1

To Prison

Chapter 1

They followed him, about half a block back, watching to see where he was going, but he didn't go anywhere. He walked maybe three blocks and then stopped, just stopped, and stood there in the middle of the boardwalk. People around him moved away from him. Most of them had seen what happened. Some of them had no idea what was going on with this ragged man holding a pistol loosely at his side, a bandage around his head and his eyes staring at something far far away. They just knew that this man was not normal, that something was wrong with him, and that he had a gun. People kept moving away from him.

Except for the two men following him who stopped for a moment when he stopped, then moved toward him. He had his back to them. They carefully, slowly moved to where he could see them, but he wasn't looking.

"Jarrod – " Nick said.

Jarrod Barkley looked up, his blue eyes seeing but not seeing.

Nick took a chance and slowly reached for the gun his brother was holding. Jarrod let him take it. And then he crashed to the ground.

Heath barely had time to catch him before he hit the boardwalk, hard. Nick tucked the pistol under his belt and together he and Heath got down and unfolded their older brother from the heap he'd collapsed into. They got him straight onto his back. The bandage around his head was bloody and he was as limp as a dead fish.

Before they had time to worry about what they were going to do, an older grey-haired man appeared bending beside them. "I'm Dr. Saxton," he said quickly. "Who are you to this man?" He quickly put his stethoscope into his ears to check on Jarrod.

"His brothers," Nick said. "What happened to him?"

"Shot," Dr. Saxton said and took put the stethoscope back around his neck, "but that's not his main problem. I don't think he's eaten in days and it's not hard to tell he's exhausted and out of his head. I've never seen a man drive himself to death before, but your brother may be the one to do it."

Nick and Heath looked at each other, alarmed. A man appeared with a stretcher, saying, "Here, Doc," and handing it to him.

The doctor got up and handed the stretcher down to Heath. "Let's get him back up to his room," Dr. Saxton said.

Nick and Heath lifted Jarrod onto the stretcher and followed the doctor into the small nearby hotel. They carried Jarrod up to the room he'd come from and got him back to bed. It was awkward trying to get the limp rag of him out of his clothes and boots, but they managed, and Jarrod never stirred. As soon as they had him in bed, Dr. Saxton checked his heartbeat and breathing again.

"Well?" Nick asked.

Before he could get an answer, someone came in the door and they looked up to see the sheriff. Sheriff Fain came in slowly, asking, "How is he, Doc?"

"He'll probably be all right but it'll take a while," Dr. Saxton said.

Sheriff Fain said, "That's just as well. It'll take me a couple days to get rid of Hyatt. I'll wire Stockton to get somebody here to take him back and stand trial for killing Mr. Barkley's wife." Then he sighed. "By then, I guess Mr. Barkley will be ready for me to take him into custody."

Nick and Heath both flared up. "Custody?" Nick said.

Sheriff Fain looked right at him. "I have to charge him with attempted murder, and assault with intent to kill, and bribing an elected official."

"Wait a minute," Heath said. "You gave me the money back."

"I still did what he bribed me to do," Sheriff Fain said, "and I'm the one who's gonna have to answer for that. I'm sorry, I got no choice." And he produced a set of manacles.

"He's out of his head!" Nick said. "How can you charge him with anything?"

"We'll sort that out later," the sheriff said and proceeded to lock one manacle around Jarrod's left wrist and the other around the bedpost, below the frame. Thankfully, there was a good two-foot chain between the bracelets. Jarrod would at least be able to move a bit when he was up to it.

But Nick and Heath were both still alarmed, and livid. "Sheriff, Hyatt killed my brother's wife," Nick said. "Don't you understand, he hasn't been himself at all. He's no killer."

"He almost killed you," Sheriff Fain said, looking Nick straight in the eye.

"He never would have," Heath said. "Sheriff, please, think again about what you're doing."

"I know exactly what I'm doing," the sheriff said without explaining his own part in this, his own past of losing a wife to a man who never paid for it. That was none of anybody else's business, but he also knew something else. "If you two had been ten seconds later, I'd have either had to shoot your brother dead or he'd be facing a rope. As it is, he still has to pay for crimes he's committed, and if you ever want to get back the brother you thought you knew, you better let him pay."

Nick and Heath didn't quite follow. They almost did, but the confusion was still on their faces.

"I'm guessing your brother's always been a straight-up man," Sheriff Fain said. "At least, any man with brothers who'd do what you did out there had to be worth it. If you want him to be that straight-up man again, he's gonna have to pay for what he's done. If he doesn't, it's gonna haunt him the rest of his days and you'll never get back the man you thought you knew. You've got to let him pay."

"You're talking about prison," Nick said. "Jarrod's a lawyer. Do you know how many men he's put away over the years? Most of them are ready to kill him if he's put into a prison with them!"

"You might not have realized it, but you're in Nevada," Sheriff Fain said. "He committed his crimes in Nevada. If he's a California man, I doubt he's put anybody in prison here."

Nick thought back frantically, but he couldn't recall enough. He didn't know enough about the men Jarrod had prosecuted in his career, or defended. He knew there were at least two or three men he'd defended but still went to prison and still bore him a grudge. But Nick's head was spinning. He couldn't remember what he needed to remember. He didn't know if Jarrod had ever prosecuted or defended a man who'd be in prison in Nevada.

Through all of this, Jarrod just lay there as still as death. Dr. Saxton finally said, "Let's just see how he does over the next day or two before you decide what to do with him, Sheriff."

Sheriff Fain nodded. "I'm gonna have to send to Carson City for a judge and a prosecutor anyway. The circuit court judge isn't due here for another couple of months but another judge will come for something like this if I ask for it."

Nick and Heath both heaved big sighs and looked down at their brother. Nick shook his head. Jarrod was in big trouble, and they knew it could have been a lot worse, but it was going to be bad anyway. The worst part was, they both knew he had earned it. He was going to be going to hell, and he had earned it.

XXXXXX

When Jarrod finally woke up, it was very early next morning. The first thing he felt was the need to find a wc, but when he tried to get up he found his arm manacled and all but his underclothes gone. Nick was in a chair beside the bed, snoring. Jarrod looked around in confusion. He didn't remember how he got here. All he remembered was – awful.

Nick snorted and woke up at his brother's movement. He looked down at blue eyes looking back at him. Jarrod said, "I need to relieve myself."

Nick got up and pulled a commode to the beside. Jarrod realized that since he was tethered to the bed, this was going to have to do. He got up as best he could, thankful for the extra chain on the manacles, and used the commode. Nick pulled it out the way when he was done.

Jarrod laid himself back down and stared at the ceiling. Nick sat back down, asking, "How do you feel?"

Jarrod didn't say a thing in reply for long seconds. He was remembering what had happened. He was remembering having Nick at the point of his gun. He was remembering wanting to kill him because he was keeping him from getting to Hyatt. Hyatt – "Where's Hyatt?" Jarrod said.

Nick leaned back in his chair. "Jail," he said. "He confessed. He'll be going back to Stockton for trial."

Jarrod raised his left arm, jangling the chain. "I'm under arrest."

"You bet you are," Nick said, his anger starting to come up into his throat now that Jarrod was sounding half stable, at least. "You're gonna pay for this and you're gonna make us pay, too, and if you weren't chained to that bed I'd take you out in the street and lay you out there for a week."

Jarrod's eyes hardened. He glared at his younger brother even harder than he had when he had him at gunpoint, but he said nothing.

Nick had been hoping for some remorse at least, for what Jarrod had done to Hyatt, for the gun Jarrod pulled on him, but it wasn't there. All that was there was a hard, high wall. Jarrod wasn't about to let him in.

"Heath's gone home to fetch Mother and Audra here," Nick tried.

That made a little difference, but not enough. Jarrod just said, "No."

"Sorry," Nick said, "you gave up any right you had to say no when you punched me out and left the house. You're in the custody of the State of Nevada now, boy, and they're gonna throw the book at you. We can't get you out of it either."

"Who said I wanted you to?" Jarrod said, lay back and rested his left arm over his eyes. "Go home, Nick. Keep everybody there. I don't need you to be here to send me off to prison."

Nick got up and leaned down into his brother's face. "Now you listen to me. You're lucky you're not facing a rope, and if anybody's earned the right to take you to task in the mess you've brought down on this family, it's me. You slugged me out. You left me chasing you all over eastern California and you took your gun to me in the street out there yesterday. You are gonna eat what I dish out to you, and you're not gonna say the word 'no' to me or anybody else in this family as long as I'm around to hear it. You got that, _big brother_?"

Nick said the words "big brother" as full of venom and nasty as he could muster, but nothing he said broke Jarrod's icy resistance. Jarrod said nothing in reply. Nick sat back down, and they just waited together in silence.


	2. Chapter 2

Chapter 2

Heath rode to the nearest railhead, stabled his horse, and took the train back to Stockton, arriving late in the afternoon of the day after the disaster in Rimfire. All the way home he had been trying to think of how he was going to break this news to Victoria and Audra, and he struggled. At least he didn't have to tell them Jarrod had murdered Cass Hyatt, but he'd have to find a way to tell them the rest, and it would hurt them. He didn't know how to plan out the words to do that.

Before he went home, he checked in with a local lawyer he knew Jarrod trusted, a man a little younger than Jarrod named Peter Cramer. Cramer was available to help, but he wasn't admitted to practice in Nevada. Nevertheless, he agreed to go to Rimfire to do whatever he could. Heath knew that was going to have to do for now.

When he arrived at the house, Victoria and Audra came running down from upstairs when they heard the door close. "What happened? Did you find Jarrod? Where is he?" Victoria asked even as she was still on the stairs.

She came close enough to Heath that he felt the need to take hold of her arms as he said, "Come on, sit down, I'll tell you everything."

He steered Victoria to the settee in the living room and sat her down there. Audra sat beside her, both of them looking like they would burst into tears at any moment. Heath sat on the coffee table, leaning toward them.

"Jarrod's alive, he didn't kill Hyatt," Heath said first and watched the relief pour of his mother and sister. "But he's in trouble over this, legal trouble in Nevada."

"What trouble?" Victoria asked quickly.

"He tried to kill Hyatt," Heath said. "Nick and I stopped him, but he's still facing assault charges and attempted murder. And Hyatt was in jail for disturbing the peace when Jarrod caught up to him. Jarrod bribed a sheriff to let him out. Jarrod's not well. He's been shot – the side of the head – and he's driven himself into the ground. I didn't get to talk to him before I left. He wasn't awake. Nick stayed with him."

Victoria got up. "Where is he? We have to get there."

Heath stood with her and kept his hands on his shoulders. "We'll go there, but we can't go before tomorrow. That's when the next train is."

In tears now, Victoria's hands went to her face, covering her mouth. She had no idea what to say. She wanted to do something _right now_, but there was nothing, except – "We'll get him a lawyer."

"I already did," Heath assured her. "Peter Cramer is going to Rimfire tomorrow too. We'll leave the legal stuff to him for now."

Audra stood up, too, in tears as well, and took hold of her mother's arm. But Victoria was lost in confusion, in disbelief, in the inability to do anything at all about any of this _right now_.

Heath sighed and said, "Mother, Audra, what I'd do now if I was you is get some rest. We're in for a terrible time for a long time, and you're gonna need it. We'll get the southbound train tomorrow afternoon, take it to the closest railhead to Rimfire and get there late tomorrow night. It'll be a long hard trip. Today you need to rest up for it and for what comes next."

Audra said, "We'll be up to it."

Heath smiled. "I know you will. But you need to know – with what he's done, Jarrod's gonna be going to prison, at least for a while. You better be ready for that."

Victoria nodded and drew herself together. "We'll be ready for whatever comes. We'll be ready."

XXXXXXXX

Jarrod was finally able to take some solid food that evening, although he still spent most of his time asleep. Nick stayed with him continuously, eating with him, watching over him, talking to the doctor about his condition and his care. Still off somewhere alone in his head, Jarrod said very little when he was awake. Nick didn't try to push him.

It was after dark that first night when Sheriff Fain came in again. He saw Jarrod with his eyes open, saw Nick reading a book. Nick looked up when the sheriff came in and closed the book. Sheriff Fain said, "Can you get hold of your family in Stockton?"

"I can wire them," Nick said, getting up. "Why? What's going on?"

"I wired the DA in Carson City and he's talked to the judge. The DA wants to try your brother's case up there rather than come down here for it."

"Why? He should be tried here where things happened."

"That's the problem. This is a small town, and everybody knows what happened. Most folks saw it happen. The DA is afraid he won't be able to get a jury composed of anybody but witnesses."

Jarrod was listening. Without looking at anyone, he abruptly said, "He's right."

"Do you have a lawyer yet, Mr. Barkley?" Sheriff Fain asked.

"No," Jarrod said. "But I don't need one for this. I don't have any objection to being tried in Carson City."

"Jarrod, maybe you better get some advice before you agree to this," Nick said.

"No," Jarrod said. "If I had a client facing a trial in a town where everybody saw him do what he did, I'd move for a change of venue myself."

Sheriff Fain shrugged at Nick's frown. Nick said, "You can't think my brother is competent to make a decision like this."

"I'm competent," Jarrod said. "I understand the charges. I understand the procedure. I understand what the DA wants and why."

Nick wanted to shut Jarrod up somehow, but the sheriff shrugged again. "If he agrees, I've got no choice. I'll wire back and we'll arrange for getting up there. You best wire your family right away and tell them to hold off coming here. I'll stay here with your brother while you go do that. I don't want him by himself."

Nick grumbled, but went out for the telegraph office.

Sheriff Fain took the chair Nick vacated. Jarrod still didn't look at him, but he said, "I'm not sorry about any of this, Sheriff – except for getting you involved like I did. I shouldn't have bribed you. I regret that."

"I believe you," Sheriff Fain said. "And I regret letting you leave that money with me and kicking Hyatt out into the street. I'm gonna have to answer for that myself, but that's for another time. Give it a few days. You might be changing your mind about what you regret. Marshals are coming for Hyatt tomorrow, so I'll be moving you off to my jail tomorrow night, if the Doc okays it. Some bars in front of your face and you may start feeling some of that regret you don't have yet."

Jarrod was beginning to think again. Not straight, not yet, but some sense of right and wrong was beginning to come back to him. "Maybe," he said.

Sheriff Fain decided to nurse things along. He said, "You got a good family, your brother sticking with you like this after you took a gun to him. I was about to shoot you, you know."

"I didn't know," Jarrod said. He still hadn't looked at the sheriff.

Sheriff Fain said, "Your other brother going for your family – you got a debt to pay to them that might even be bigger than the one you're gonna have to pay to society."

"I'll pay what I have to pay," Jarrod said. "I've known that all along."

"And you still did what you did. I told you I know how you felt, and I do, but I gotta tell you now. I'm glad I didn't take the road you took when it happened to me. I used to not be so sure, but now I'm sure."

"Well, then, something good did come out of all this."

"That and Hyatt is gonna get what's coming to him. I'm afraid that's gonna have to be enough justice for the both of us, Mr. Barkley."

Jarrod grew quiet then, closed his eyes and fell asleep again. Sheriff Fain leaned back in his chair, and his first wife's face came into his mind's eye. He was married to his second wife now and happy again, but for a moment he missed his first wife so much it hurt. He leaned his head back and closed his own eyes for a while.


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter 3

They got the telegram at the Barkley ranch in time to cancel their plans to go to Rimfire, but not in time to catch the train north to Sacramento and then east to Carson City. It was going to be an even longer trip than to Rimfire. They had to put it off for another day.

"We might should wait until we get word they're moving Jarrod to Carson City," Heath said to the lawyer, when he went into town to tell him what was what.

Jarrod's lawyer, Peter Cramer, said, "That's up to you, but I'm going to get over there on tomorrow's train and see what I can do with the DA."

"Jarrod's already agreed to the move," Heath said.

"And I don't necessarily disagree with him," Cramer said. "You really don't want jurors who saw you commit the crime. But maybe I can talk to the DA and get these charges reduced. Even if I don't, I'm going to have to hire Jarrod a local lawyer or get someone to sponsor me handling his defense. I'm not admitted in Nevada. And it might help me with the DA there if you and the family are there before Jarrod is.

"All right," Heath said. "We'll head to Carson City with you tomorrow. We'll be there when Jarrod arrives."

Cramer nodded.

Heath wasn't sure any of that was going to work, but he found out as soon as he got home that Victoria agreed with the plan. The next morning Heath helped Victoria and Audra gather up to take the train to Carson City. They wanted to be sure to be there when Jarrod arrived. They wanted to help Cramer with the DA if they could.

As it turned out when they got there, Jarrod was still in Rimfire, but now Cass Hyatt wasn't. He was on his way to Stockton, and as soon as he was, Sheriff Fain came to the hotel to take Jarrod to jail. Jarrod was doing better now and Dr. Saxton approved moving him. Jarrod raised no complaint, and when the sheriff locked him into the cell Hyatt had just vacated, Jarrod just laid himself down on the cot.

Nick watched from the jailhouse office. Jarrod hadn't interacted any more than that with anybody. "When do we go to Carson City?" he asked.

"No matter how we do this, even if we go pick up the train - which I can't afford - it's gonna take the better part of three days because there's no straight line from here to there," Sheriff Fain said. "We'll ride. I have to find me a deputy to take care of things here while I'm up there."

Nick didn't relish the ride, but he also didn't relish the vision of Jarrod in chains on a train that would pass through Stockton. "You're gonna have to be a witness, aren't you?"

"Yeah," Sheriff Fain said, and he wondered if he was going to be facing charges of his own. He'd have to tell any deputy he hired that he might be on the job for quite a while.

Nick looked back at his brother again. "Three days means camping out. Do you trust him not to run?"

"No. You're not gonna like this, but I'm gonna have to make sure he's cuffed to a tree at night," Sheriff Fain said.

Nick nodded, figuring it was going to be something like that.

"Have you heard back from your family?"

Nick nodded. "They left for Carson City today. They should be there tonight."

"Does he know that?" The sheriff nodded toward Jarrod's cell.

"He knows," Nick said. "I'm not keeping a thing from him. He's gonna swallow everything he has to swallow in this."

The sheriff found a deputy that day, and early the next morning, he and Nick started off with Jarrod toward Carson City. The sheriff made Jarrod wear the cuffs all the way. They were chafing pretty good by the end of the first day, but they wouldn't fit over his coat or shirtsleeves, so there was no choice. The sheriff did cuff him to a tree at night, as he had threatened. The sight of that cut deeply into Nick, but Jarrod put up with all of it without complaining.

He was virtually silent the whole three days to Carson City, but Nick could tell he was not off in his head somewhere. Jarrod knew what was happening. He was thinking again. His wound was healing and he had gotten rid of the bandage. Except for the cuffs, he looked like any other cowpoke on the road, but he was silent. He simply had nothing to say.

When they got to Carson City, they took Jarrod to jail right away. When the law there removed the cuffs, Nick got a good look at how badly his brother's wrists were scraped up, and he was a little worried about the head wound too. "I want a doctor to see my brother."

"I'm all right," Jarrod said, the longest sentence he'd uttered since Rimfire.

"You'll see a doctor," Nick insisted. "You've lost any right to say 'no.'"

Nick had said that before. Jarrod remembered and simply gave in. The doctor came, looked at his wrists and his temple and put a salve on both, saying, "He'll be all right in a few days. He's a bit run down, but not too bad off. He won't need to see me again."

It was only a few minutes after the doctor left that the Barkleys got word Jarrod and Nick were in Carson City, and they were at the jail fast. There were no joyous greetings, no kisses or hands touching through the bars. Jarrod sat up on his bunk but he would not look at his mother or his sister or his brothers. Audra was in tears to see him, how awful and drained he looked, how he would not look at them or even acknowledge her when she said hello.

Victoria said, "I'd like a minute with my son."

Heath took Audra by the shoulders and took her out. Nick squeezed his mother's hand and left, too, closing the cell block door behind him. That left Victoria alone with her first born, who still would not even look at her.

She didn't insist. She didn't scold. She didn't reprimand. She only said, "I got a telegram from Sheriff Madden this morning. They sentenced Cass Hyatt. They gave him life."

Jarrod only blinked.

"Don't feel cheated, Jarrod," Victoria said.

Jarrod said only, "I don't."

"What do you feel?" his mother asked.

He didn't say anything for long seconds. Then he said, "Nothing."

Victoria said, "At some point, you will feel again, Jarrod. I don't know what it will be, but you will feel it, deeply, unrelentingly. I know you. You're my first born. We spent the first four years of your life together, you and me, alone most of the time because your father was away. I know you, maybe even better than I know myself. At some point, perhaps tomorrow, perhaps a year from tomorrow, you will feel again. And you'll need us again. We'll be ready for that."

She started to leave, but Jarrod said, "Mother – "

She stopped.

He still didn't look at her, but he said, "I'm sorry I did this to you. If I feel anything, that's what it is. Sorry I did it to the people I did it to, other than Hyatt."

Victoria longed to reach for him, to touch his hand, to hold it, to hold him, but he wouldn't move. His brief apology was all there was going to be. "We're here, Jarrod. We'll always be here."

She waited. He finally nodded.

But that was all. Victoria left the cell block and found her family waiting in the office. Jarrod's lawyer, Peter Cramer was there. Nick said, "Peter has news, Mother."

"What?" Victoria asked.

"Nothing confidential," Cramer said. "I've talked to the DA. Being able to tell him you were all here really helped. He's willing to drop the assault with intent to kill and the attempted murder charges in exchange for Jarrod pleading guilty to an aggravated assault charge and one count of bribing an official, with a sentence of two years on the assault charge and one on the bribery charge, running consecutively. That would mean three years in prison, here in the State prison in Carson City. I intend to recommend to Jarrod that he take it."

"Don't you think there's even a chance he'd be found innocent?" Victoria asked. "Cass Hyatt killed his wife."

Sheriff Fain was still with them and quickly said, "Mrs. Barkley, 'innocent' may not be what he needs to hear. Your son is a decent man at heart, I got no doubt of that. I've seen it before. A decent man who's done wrong needs to pay for it, or his conscience will make him pay forever. You best let your son make this decision, whether he fights or whether he takes his punishment."

Victoria stared at him, then looked at Nick and then Heath. Her sons looked like they didn't know what to say. Victoria said, "Go talk to him, see what he says."

Cramer went into the cell block. They could see him at Jarrod's cell, Jarrod still sitting on the bunk. They talked in low voices that no one in the office could hear, but Jarrod did finally look up at who he was talking to. They saw him nod.

Victoria closed her eyes. Now it was real. Maybe it wasn't as bad as it could have been, but now it was real. Jarrod – her first born, the light of her life, the son of her girlhood, the child she learned her motherhood with, the baby she nursed and rocked and took care of when he had pneumonia or when he skinned a knee, the little boy who had grown into such a wonderful upstanding man – Jarrod was going to prison.

Victoria gave in to tears and left the office. Audra, Nick and Heath followed her.


	4. Chapter 4

Chapter 4

There wasn't much to the court proceedings the next morning. Peter Cramer had gotten a local attorney to sponsor him so he could represent Jarrod. The DA explained the plea agreement to the judge. To support the agreement, Cramer explained all the fine attributes of the man he was defending and the tragedy that had gotten him here, and Jarrod pled guilty. The judge entered the verdict and sentence agreed upon and remanded Jarrod to the custody of the Nevada State Prison at Carson City. It took all of five minutes.

Only the family was there to watch it happen. When the judge left the bench and they approached Jarrod, he was already being handcuffed again. Victoria kissed him on the cheek, but he did not respond except to say, "Good-bye, Mother." Then they took him away.

His family was left there, alone with just each other. Victoria and Audra wept. Nick and Heath did their best to hold them, console them, but there was no consolation, only a feeling of unreality and grief as hard as the grief the day Tom Barkley died.

Victoria wiped her eyes. "We'd better get home. Nick and Heath have work to do. Audra, you'd better get back to the orphanage, they need you, those little ones – "

She stopped. She realized what she was saying – that they were going to go on, that life was going to go on as if nothing were happening. But of course, it had to, even if right this minute, none of them wanted it to.

XXXXXXX

Intake at the prison didn't take long. Jarrod was taken inside, relieved of the handcuffs, stripped of his regular clothing and searched excruciatingly carefully. He was put through a shower and given a prison uniform with the number 2909 on it. He was photographed for the records and then he was taken to a cell.

No one checked to see if anyone was in here that Jarrod had anything to do with. No one really cared, not even Jarrod, not yet. He was put in a cell with three other men, a room maybe ten feet by ten feet if it was lucky, with two double bunks lining the walls and a urinal in the corner in the floor and that was it. It was cleaner than Jarrod expected, but definitely crowded. Three men already occupied the room – two white men and a black man, one white man older than Jarrod and the other two men younger. They were all in their bunks, just lying there, two in the lower bunks and one in one of the uppers. They all looked up when Jarrod was pushed through the door, but no one said a word.

Jarrod climbed up into the empty bunk and lay down, and so started the first day of the next three years of his life.

But he was rousted out of the bunk fast, as were all the other men in his cell and cell block. "Mess call," the black man said to Jarrod.

Jarrod fell in line as directed. He hadn't realized it was so close to time for the noon meal. He wasn't hungry and decided it was just as well when he got a look at the "food" he'd be eating. Utilitarian, and not very appetizing.

"Better eat up," his black cell mate sitting next to him said. "It'll be a hard afternoon out there on the rockpiles."

Jarrod hadn't given any thought to the work he'd be required to do here. He thought he'd just do it. He took a look at his hands. "Lily white" Nick called them. Not a laborer's hands. No callouses. He bet he'd have blisters before the end of the day, if he was going to be breaking rock all afternoon.

And he did. Four hours out there in the rock dust and the heat, and when they were marched back into their cells, Jarrod took a look at his "lily white" hands. Blisters now, as he thought there would be, and until they brought the water bucket around half an hour later, he had no way to even rinse them off.

"Drink it! Don't wash in it! You're not gonna get any more!" the guard yelled at him.

Jarrod took a drink, held it in his mouth until the guard moved on and then spat some of it into his hands. It stung like crazy and there was no place clean to dry off. Jarrod just put up with the sting and let his hands air dry.

His cell mates finally all began to stare at him. Jarrod looked back and finally said, "What?"

"What are you in for?" the younger white man said. "You don't look like you belong here."

Jarrod decided he'd better stick with how bad it was, not what the charges were whittled down to. "I was killing a man. They stopped me but they charged me with attempted murder and assault with intent to kill. And I bribed a sheriff." Jarrod left it at that.

"What time you got?"

"Three years."

"Well, that ain't so bad, considering all that you done," the black man said. "I grabbed a beer keg out of an alley behind a saloon. Keg was just about empty but they gave me two years in here anyway."

"That's 'cause of the color you are, Lionel," the older white man said with a laugh. "That's why you got an extra two months tacked on when you hit that guard, too."

"What's your name?" the younger white man asked.

"Barkley."

"That's a good solid California name," the older white man said and then it dawned on him. "You that lawyer from California, aren't you, defends people? You musta been framed!"

"I wasn't framed," Jarrod said. "I was killing him. Drowning him in a watering trough. I'd have done it too but somebody saved his arse." He gave them a hard look as he said it. He knew he couldn't appear soft around here.

The younger white man believed him, although the older still looked skeptical. Lionel, the black man, just watched.

"Who are you?" Jarrod asked the black man.

"Lionel," he said. "Just Lionel."

"No last name?"

"Only on paper," Lionel said.

Jarrod turned to the younger white man. "How about you?"

"Jim Pool," the younger man said. "This here is Bent Simms."

"Bent, huh?" Jarrod said. "Good name for a convict."

Simms shrugged. "Guess my mama saw it coming."

"So, if you're a lawyer," Pool said, "can you get me out of here?"

Jarrod snorted sarcastically. "If I could get anybody out of here, it would be me. My lawyering days are over." He felt a twinge of regret when he said it.

"Maybe you can help me figure it out though, you know, precedent and all those fancy words you throw around."

"You think they're gonna let either one of us near a law book?" Jarrod asked. "What are you in for?"

"Armed robbery," Pool said. "I hit a store that sold liquor."

"Did you shoot anybody?"

"No, just got caught."

"What time did they give you?"

"Two years. I ain't been in here one yet."

Jarrod looked at Simms. "You?"

Simms hesitated, but then said, "I shot a mad dog. Turned out it belonged to the judge and he said it wasn't mad. I got two years."

Jarrod laughed and shook his head. "I got you all beat," he said and laid back again. He looked at his hands and wondered how he could cover them up when he worked tomorrow. Heaven knew they weren't going to give him any gloves. The blisters hurt and he wondered how he might pop them to get the fluid out at least.

Lionel saw him looking. "Grease," he said.

Jarrod looked at him.

"From the food at dinner," Lionel said. "Smear some on your hands and on your shirt for tomorrow. You'll draw flies, but it's all your gonna get to help your hands."

Jarrod worried more about infection than flies, but these men knew more about day to day survival in here than he did. He said, "I'll give it a try."

When dinner rolled around, Jarrod took Lionel's advice. He noticed that nobody was looking at him like he was crazy when he dipped his finger in the grease and started smearing it on his hands and shirt. Apparently, this was a tried and true cure, without a lot of infection.

Too bad the food wasn't good for more than medicinal grease.

That night, at lights out, Jarrod lay in his bunk and stared into the darkness. He wondered if he should start scraping the wall to take count of his days in this place, but then he decided to skip it. Did he even want to know how the days were passing and how many more he'd have to be here? No. This was just existing, worse than being in the army and counting the days the war was lasting. He'd tolerated that.

But he had family at home who wrote to him and kept him going during the war. Would they write to him here? Was he such a pariah now that they'd completely turn away, despite what his mother said about always being there? He supposed he'd find out. For now, all he could count on was that Day 1 was over, and Night 1 was here.

His cellmates all started to snore. Jarrod turned on his side and faced the wall – and for the first time, he saw Beth's face. Not smiling, not happy, not anything but solemn, sad, disappointed. Disappointed in him, for being here, for what he'd done, for what he'd become because of her. For the first time, Jarrod cramped up with regret. _Oh, Beth, I'm so sorry. Please forgive me. I'm so very sorry._


	5. Chapter 5

Chapter 5

For the next few days, Jarrod was haunted by the regret that wouldn't come until now. Seeing Beth in his mind's eye that first night, seeing her sadness and disappointment in him, was tearing his insides out and there was nothing he could do about it. He didn't eat well, he just did his work in the prison garden, in the laundry, on the rock pile. Once a week they all worked on cleaning and disinfecting the whole place, which helped with the smell and keeping sickness down but didn't help Jarrod's hands much. But he was too wrapped up inside himself to notice his hands. He didn't even see that they were becoming bloodied by the end of the day, the blisters refusing to harden into callouses. He didn't even feel the pain, until Lionel saw the blood where he wiped his hands on his pants.

"Let me look at those," Lionel said. "They don't look good. You need more than grease."

"I'm all right," Jarrod said.

"You wanna lose those hands? They ain't gonna like it around here if they have to chop them off – makes them look bad to the governor."

"Lionel's right," Pool said. "We got a doctor here. You better get them looked at. Hey! Hey!"

Pool started yelling for a guard. One came, and when he saw Jarrod's hands, he took him out and down to the prison hospital. Jarrod didn't know it then but figured out over time that communicable diseases and injuries that affected an inmate's ability to work or might end up with amputations were the things that really got attention around here.

There was another man being attended to when Jarrod got to the prison hospital, but it wasn't long before an old man wearing spectacles was examining his hands, saying, "Good thing you didn't wait much longer to have these looked at. You've been using cooking grease, haven't you?"

"There was nothing else," Jarrod said.

"Damned home cures." The doctor proceeded to clean Jarrod's hands, first with soap and water that stung, as Jarrod knew it would. He had been permitted to wash his hands twice a day and it always stung. But then the doctor took alcohol to them, and Jarrod nearly screamed with the burning pain. Then the doctor put some kind of salve on them, the brown stuff that Dr. Merar back in Stockton loved to use. Then the doctor bandaged them – with very short strips of bandage.

"You'll have to be careful, I can't use any more of the bandage," the doctor said. "I can't give you enough you might use it to hang yourself."

"I'm not gonna hang myself," Jarrod said.

"You haven't been here long. Give yourself a month or two and see if you feel the same way. How long are you in for?"

"Three years," Jarrod said.

The doctor shook his head. "You don't belong here. I can tell by your hands."

"I nearly killed a man with these hands," Jarrod said. "That's why I'm here."

The doctor looked at him. "I've heard about you. You're that fella that used to be a lawyer in California, a good defense lawyer as I recall."

_Used to be a lawyer_. Jarrod still felt a twinge about that, but so far he hadn't started to wonder what he was going to do for a living when he got out of here. He hadn't started to wonder if his family would even take him back and give him a job on the ranch. That wondering would come, but it wasn't here yet. Release was too far off.

"Yeah, I used to be a lawyer," Jarrod said.

The doctor sighed. "As one professional man to another, I don't know how you came to this, but you get them to bring you back here after work tomorrow and I'll change these bandages. I'll try to look out for you."

Jarrod was surprised. Empathy? In this place? For a would-be murderer like him? Jarrod was amazed at the tiny bit of good the doctor's words seem to touch in him. He hadn't felt any bit of good inside himself since Beth was killed, not a drop. "Thanks," he said.

XXXXXXX

Being treated by the prison doctor worked. In time, his hands healed and began to callous over. In time, Beth's face faded from his dreams, but not his waking hours. He was protecting his heart as best he could, but he was feeling that remorse sinking in – not remorse in general. A very specific remorse and responsibility to his wife. She deserved better than this out of a husband. Any guilt he was feeling was to Beth.

And he was getting lonelier and lonelier. A month went by, and still no letter from home. Not a one. Just when he was certain they had turned their backs on him, a letter came. Jarrod recognized Audra's handwriting on the envelope. He was shaking when he opened it and read it, but he was up in his bunk and hid his feelings from his cellmates. You didn't want to look any bit of weak around here. He rolled over to face the wall and read.

_Dear Jarrod, _

_ We'd have written sooner but we thought you needed time to adjust without our interference. That might have been a mistake, I don't know, but as I write this, everyone is with me. We want you to know that everyone is here and part of this letter._

_ We miss you terribly. Things are going along all right. Nick and Heath are getting used to using Peter Cramer as the family lawyer and he's doing a good job for them, but whenever they have to go to town, you can tell they wish you were here. Mother and I busy ourselves with the usual activity, but Mother has also started to come to the orphanage with me more frequently. She says the children make her laugh more, which is true. They can keep us entertained almost all day._

_ Things in Stockton are as they usually are. Sheriff Madden hasn't had any really bad problems to deal with lately. The worst over the last six weeks, he says, is the drummer from out of town who got mad at a wrangler who accidentally knocked him down and caused him to break several bottles of the whiskey he was peddling. Sheriff Madden had to keep him overnight for disturbing the peace. Nick and Heath said to tell you that Harry at the saloon said he has a bottle of your favorite scotch with your name on it and he'll keep it safe for you._

_ Jarrod, please don't think we've forgotten you or have turned away from you. We love you and we miss you, and the last thing we want is for you to feel deserted. We are just trying to adjust, as you are, and we'll try to do better in the future._

_ Nick and Heath said to tell you they'd be coming over to Nevada to look at horses in a month or so and they'd try to get in to visit you. Watch for them._

_ All my love,_

_ Audra_

Jarrod would have cried at her letter, if he hadn't hardened his heart along with his hands. As it was, it lifted him a bit to know they still loved him and missed him, but it also frightened him a bit to think Nick and Heath might show up here. The bad food, and the distress he was keeping inside, had affected his eating, and the constant physical activity added to that had cost him several pounds. His prison uniform didn't fit anymore, hanging on him like rags. They wouldn't let him have a belt or suspenders, but they did let him trade in the pants for a smaller size so they wouldn't fall off.

Weeks fell off as much as the pounds did. Jarrod was thankful he'd managed to stay out of trouble so far. His cellmate Simms wasn't so lucky. He got into a fight at the rockpile one afternoon, went after another inmate with his hammer, and spent 48 hours in the punishment hole. Jarrod had no idea where that was or how bad it was, but Simms came back from there smelling rancid even though he was in a clean uniform, and his eyes were glazed over from not seeing the sun and the insanity of being alone and crammed into the dark and the heat. Jarrod remembered Heath's experience with the iron box when that scum Rizely had him and Nick illegally imprisoned. Jarrod remembered how long it took for Heath to recover physically and emotionally from that torture. Jarrod didn't want it to happen to him.

So, Jarrod kept to the straight and narrow, did what he had to do, did the work they shoved him into day after day. He had no more trouble with his hands, and the worst injury he got was when he tripped at the rockpile and banged his knee. It was nothing, not even needing a trip to the hospital.

But even though Beth had faded from his nightmares, she still hung onto his heart in the daylight. _I could be with you. I should be with you. None of this should be happening, none of it. We should be building our home and expecting our first child. None of this should be real._

But of course it was, and he had to swallow it, because he had earned it. Every day told him again and again he had earned it, but the effect was somewhat perverse. Instead of wishing he'd never gone after Hyatt, he began to wish his brothers had never stopped him from killing him. He began to wish he had killed Cass Hyatt and even hanged for his crime.

And then, one morning when visitors were permitted into the prison, Jarrod got the word that he had some. He remembered Audra's letter. Nick and Heath were coming to Nevada. Jarrod had to take deep breaths to stop himself from shaking, but when he went to the visitors' room and saw his brothers there, he almost burst into tears anyway. He sucked it in, and he sat down at a table with them.

They looked at him like they were seeing a ghost. He knew they were taking in his weight loss, his shaggy hair and scruffy beard, and he felt like dirt. "Hello," he said, his voice rough. And then he didn't know what to say.

"How are you, Jarrod?" Nick asked, his voice shaking.

"Still kicking," Jarrod said with a sick smile, which he promptly lost. "You shouldn't have come."

"Why?" Heath asked.

Jarrod looked at him like he was crazy. "Do you think I don't know how I look?"

Nick and Heath both took deep breaths, not knowing what to say.

"What are you going to tell Mother and Audra?" Jarrod asked, beginning to feel and sound belligerent. "That I'm fine? That I look healthy and I'm getting along?" He shook his head. "You shouldn't have come."

"The hell," Nick said. "Maybe you can sit in here and feel sorry for yourself if you want, but it's not gonna stop us from coming. We saved your sorry butt in Rimfire. We got an investment in it. We're not giving up on you even if you are."

"We'll tell Mother and Audra whatever the truth is," Heath said. "You look terrible. Do you want us to tell them your attitude is terrible too? Or do you want to buck up and be a Barkley again?"

Jarrod sighed and hung his head, then looked up and glared. "Think back on being under Rizely, Heath. Imagine it had lasted for months and was gonna last for a couple more years, then tell me how to buck up and be a Barkley again. I'll hold on in here as best I can, but being a Barkley is the last thing I'm concerning myself with. Surviving is the first."

Heath said quietly, "When I was a kid in the war, I was in a prison camp, remember? I know what you're going through, and not just from Rizely."

"And did you 'buck up' while you were in that prison camp, or did you just hang on and survive?" Jarrod asked.

Heath looked down at his hands. Jarrod was right. There was just surviving, doing whatever it took to keep surviving. "Bucking up" came later, when he was free.

"Look," Jarrod said, "I appreciate you coming, but don't come again. Don't let Mother or Audra come. I gotta get through this somehow, and like you said, Nick. I earned this. I've got to survive it without dragging you down here with me. If you can see your way fit, welcome me home when I get out. Give me a place and a job and I'll buck up then. But for now, let me handle this as best I know how. And don't come back."


	6. Chapter 7

-Chapter 7

Winter came on, and Nevada turned colder and colder, especially at night. Jarrod shivered under a thin blanket, keeping his shoes on now to keep his feet warm, but somehow, as the temperature of the air around him went down, the temperature inside him went down, too. He ultimately read all of Audra's letter that he tried to crumple up, and he read all of the letters she and Victoria sent since, and he kept them all under his mattress. He kept the words from that crumpled up letter in his heart, memorized, soaking into whoever it was deep inside him that still wanted to be the Jarrod Barkley who had been.

_I love you, Jarrod. I'm counting the days until you're home with us again._

He remembered, he treasured the words, but he still wouldn't accept any visits from them or from anyone else. His appetite improved and he stopped losing weight, but he was still as skinny as a teen-aged kid and as dirty and miserable looking as any rat who ever crawled out of a hole in the ground. He still didn't want his family to see him like that.

His hands always got cold during the day, but at least they were well calloused now and blisters gave him no more trouble. He avoided any more trips to the punishment hole, wondering now and then if it might be worth a trip just to get warm again, but knowing it was folly to think so. The winter crawled by and gradually spring came on. Spring, with warm air outside, comfortable sleeping temperatures inside, but memories.

Memories of a trip home from Washington a year ago, a wedding in Denver, a celebration at the Barkley mansion and making love over and over again like a joyous bridegroom with the woman he'd looked for all his life. And Beth, dead in his arms in a blood-soaked horror because she had leaned over in front of him to pick flowers.

He didn't know exactly when the anniversaries went by, the wedding anniversary, the anniversary of her funeral, the anniversary of his insanity and his arrest and his incarceration, but he knew by the heating up of the weather than they had gone by and he'd been here for at least a year. He should have thought _one year down, two to go_, but he didn't think about that. Until he got a letter from Victoria telling him, it didn't occur to him that he now had passed one third of his sentence in this hell of a prison. Realizing that actually gave him a lift. One year, only one trip to the punishment hole, no more weight coming off and even some muscles coming back on. The food still dreadful, but seeming more palatable.

He got by the anniversaries. Time crept on, and he avoided any real trouble – until –

It happened at the rock pile on a hot afternoon in June. Jarrod didn't know the man working next to him. It was someone he'd never seen before or never paid attention to, someone who had never paid attention to him. A man about his age, a white man but with sun-darkened skin and greying hair. Out of the blue, the man swung his hammer at Jarrod. Jarrod saw it coming and dodged it, throwing his hand up. The hammer hit his arm but didn't break it. "What the – what are you doing?!" Jarrod yelled.

"Barkley – " the man said under his breath.

"What of it?!" Jarrod yelled back.

The man snarled in a low, ugly voice. "You don't even remember me."

"Why should I?!"

The guards were coming now. "All right, shut up and get back to work!" one of them yelled.

Jarrod kept eying the man who had come at him. As soon as the guards were gone, the man leaned in toward Jarrod and said, in a near whisper. "The State of California versus Clyde Wales. You put me in San Quentin."

Jarrod didn't remember him, but the "you put me" resonated. Jarrod had kept quiet about ever having been a prosecutor and as far as he was aware, nobody around here, including the administration, had any idea he had once been an assistant district attorney in California. This man knew. Jarrod knew he was in trouble.

He lived watching his back for days, waiting for the day Wales came at him again, or someone Wales told about him being a prosecutor did. No one else did, but Wales did, one more time, in the food line one morning. Jarrod saw him coming with some kind of sharpened instrument. Jarrod blocked him and shoved him down. A guard grabbed the weapon off the floor, and two others grabbed Wales and hustled him away. Another grabbed Jarrod, and he was hustled off, too.

But Jarrod wasn't taken to the punishment hole. He wasn't sure why, but he was taken to the office of one of the assistant wardens. The short man in glasses had one thing to say. "Tell me what happened."

Jarrod said flatly, "Wales tried to kill me."

"Why?"

Jarrod considered what he should say. Should he tell the truth, that Wales knew he had been a prosecutor? What if this man in front of him was as crooked as the road through Donner Pass? If Jarrod told him the truth, he could be as threatened as if he told everyone in this place he'd been a prosecutor. "I don't know," he ended up saying.

The assistant warden didn't believe him, but he said, "All right. Suit yourself. But Wales is going into the punishment hole, and he'll come out. And whatever he has against you, he'll start spreading around, if he hasn't done it already. He might not miss you the next time."

Jarrod still hesitated. He didn't trust anyone in this place, not a man, not even the doctor who looked after his hands.

"Suit yourself," the assistant warden said again and had the guard take him away.

Jarrod spent the morning working in the garden, looking over his shoulder. Not for Wales, since he was in the punishment hole, but for anybody else Wales might have talked to. Everyone was a threat now. Jarrod could hardly keep his hands from shaking as he worked, but the morning passed without incident, and so did the noon meal. And so did the rock pile, the evening meal, and his time in the kitchen afterward. No one was bothering him.

He didn't really understand it, but a couple days went by and no one bothered him. Maybe Wales hadn't told anyone what he knew. Maybe Wales was saving him for himself. Wales finally reappeared in the mess hall one morning, stooped over, looking sick. His time in the punishment hole hadn't done him any favors.

Jarrod risked taking advantage of the man's weakness. He gave him a hard glare, got close to him in line, and said quietly, "You've mistaken me for someone else, haven't you, Mr. Wales?" And Jarrod quietly forced his knee hard into that sensitive spot between Wales's legs. He hated doing it. It was vile and it was cruel, but it had its effect. Wales crumpled. "No one else needs to know about your mistake, do they?" Jarrod said.

A guard approached. Jarrod saw him.

Jarrod let Wales go, but he whispered in the man's ear, "Do they?"

Wales grunted. Jarrod found out through the grapevine the man was due to be released in a month, and apparently his interest in getting out of here overrode any desire he had to get at Jarrod. He was no more trouble, and neither was anyone else, and then he was gone.

XXXXX

_Maybe I want to see them again._

Weeks, then months went by, and Jarrod's life turned more peaceful for a while, making him feel more peaceful too. In all this time, he had never written back to Audra's letters. Now he did. The guards gave him a piece of paper, an envelope and what amounted to a wax crayon to write with. It had been so long since he put any words to paper that his handwriting was atrocious, but at least it was readable.

_Dear Audra –_

_ Please forgive me for failing to write all this time. I just haven't known what to say, but your letters have sustained me and every day I read them over again and feel your love over again. I don't know what I'd have done without them._

_ I know it's been well over a year now that I've been in here. I know it will not surprise you that it's been a very hard year in every way, and that's why I've never written. I know it also won't surprise you that the guards read everything that comes in and they will read this letter before it goes out, so I will not tell you anything I am not willing to tell the world. I love you. I miss you. I want more than anything to be home again to see your shining face. But I know that can't be for two more years._

_ When Nick and Heath came to see me, I told them not to come back and I am grateful they've accepted my wishes, but it's time now. I want to see them again, and I want to see you and Mother, too, but only if you are willing to see me. I am not recognizable as the man you knew. I am only a shadow of that man, physically and otherwise, but if you want to see me, then I want to see you. If you don't want to see me like this, I understand, and I will just look forward to the day I see you at home._

_ Write and tell me._

_ All my love, Jarrod_

XXXXXXX

Audra read the letter out loud and then handed it to her mother. Victoria read it over quickly as Nick said, "We'll go, soon as we can."

"Nick and I should go first," Heath said. "See how things are. We got a trip to Nevada coming up in a couple weeks."

Victoria nodded. "But if they're good enough for us to come, you wire us right away and we'll join you in Carson City. I want you there while we're there, even if we can't see Jarrod all together."

"They allow visitors once a week," Nick said. "If we see him, it'll be a whole week before you can."

"All right, then," Victoria said. "Instead of wiring us, you come home, and we'll talk it over. But if there's any way at all you think it's acceptable, I want to see him. I don't care if he looks like a walking skeleton and smells like a corpse. I want to see him."

Nick and Heath nodded.


	7. Chapter 6

**-**Chapter 6

Victoria turned away when Nick and Heath told her about their visit to Jarrod in prison. She had expected something like this, but that didn't make it any easier to hear. "Was it that bad?" she asked.

Nick and Heath looked at each other. "He's struggling, Mother," Heath said. "We knew he would."

"But he doesn't want us to come anymore," Audra said. "How can he not want to see us?"

"He doesn't want us to see him," Nick said.

"It's only been a little over two months," Victoria said. "How can he make it for three years?"

"By not seeing us," Heath said. "By concentrating on surviving. If he doesn't have to worry about us, he can concentrate on himself."

"You sound like you agree with him," Audra said.

"I do," Heath said. "He might change his mind after a while, but whatever he decides, we gotta leave it to him."

"He helped you when you were in prison! He got you out!"

"We can't get him out, Audra," Nick said. "I know it's hard thinking we can't do anything for him, but until he's ready to see us again, we best let him figure his own way through this."

"You think he's earned it," Audra said angrily. "You think he deserves this."

"He does and he knows it," Nick said. "We have to let him deal with that. If we don't, we'll never get him back."

"Nick is right," Heath said. "If we don't let him find his own way, he'll never be the man he was."

"He'll never be the man he was anyway," Victoria said. "How can he be after this?"

"Maybe he can't," Nick said, "but he can be somebody if we let him. Besides, the whole point is he doesn't want us to come back. Maybe sometime he will, but he doesn't right now, and we best let him have his way."

Victoria nodded, slowly, finally. "He'll let us write, won't he?"

"Yeah, he said he would," Nick said. "I'm not sure he'll write back, though."

"Nevermind if he doesn't," Victoria said. "All right. He's the one coping with this. We let him do it his way, at least for now."

Nick took his mother into his arms. He wanted to tell her they would all make it through this, that Jarrod would come home and everything would be all right even if it never was the way it used to be, but he couldn't. He wasn't sure he believed it yet. And there were still many, many months to go before this nightmare was over.

Later, that night, after she turned the light out in her room, Victoria stood at her window and looked out, up at the stars. She could see the Big Dipper from there, and the North Star. Beth had told her how the North Star was her star, because her family had helped slaves escaping to the north in Pennsylvania and told them to follow that star. Victoria was certain Beth had told Jarrod that, too. But where he was now, Jarrod wouldn't be seeing any stars at all. Prisoners never saw stars – Keno Nash had told her that. Prisoners were never allowed out after dark.

It broke Victoria's heart every time she looked up there. She had looked up there every night since Beth died. At first, when Jarrod was still missing, going after Cass Hyatt, Victoria imagined that he was somewhere looking up at Beth's star too. But she couldn't imagine that now. Now he was locked away. He couldn't see Beth's star anymore, and now Victoria couldn't see him either.

"I'll watch it for you, darling," she said quietly, wishing he could hear her, knowing he did not. "Until you come home and see it for yourself, I'll watch Beth's star for you."

She said that to him every night, before she said a prayer for him and for Beth, and for all that could have been.

XXXXXXXX

It wasn't long before Jarrod began to wonder whether he was right telling his family not to come see him. He had been glad to see his brothers, and he wanted to see his mother and his sister, too, if only there were some way he could clean himself up so that the man they saw was the man they wanted to see. But there wasn't. No inmate was allowed to have a straight razor to get a decent shave by. No inmate was getting a haircut other than an occasional rough cut when a barber came in or what they could chop off themselves. The best they could do was take care of their own grooming with blades that were so dull they couldn't slit their own wrists or anybody else's throat with them, so dull they didn't cut hair or shave beards worth squat. There was no way Jarrod could put weight back on with the terrible food and the constant work. He just couldn't bear his family seeing him the way he was.

Again, his reaction to it changed. Instead of any regret at all, about losing Beth, about going after Hyatt, even about being unsuccessful in killing Hyatt, Jarrod began to be more and more angry. Angry at his captors, angry with his cellmates, angry with himself. His cellmates looked almost amused about it, and he wondered if it was because they were seeing in him what had happened to them, but he didn't dwell on that introspection very long either. He just felt angry and stayed angry and nursed the anger.

The result was inevitable. As the weeks passed he became more belligerent with the other inmates. He shoved away anyone he felt was even thinking about shoving him. He ate even less, leaving half his food but growling like an animal after anyone who went for it after he left it. The guards began to pay closer attention to what he was doing and finally, in the laundry one day while he was wringing out some sheets, someone tripped over the end of one of them.

Jarrod kicked the man and sent him sprawling. "Watch what you're doing! I didn't do this laundry for you to tramp all over it!"

The man turned out to be as belligerent as Jarrod was. He bounced up and hit Jarrod hard in the mouth. His lip split and bleeding, Jarrod hit back even harder, sending the man sprawling into the wringer, knocking things over. Jarrod grabbed him and pulled him up and hit him twice again before the guards decided they'd let them have enough. Two guards grabbed Jarrod and pulled him off the other man.

Jarrod ended up with his first trip to the punishment hole.

They threw him into a tiny room with no light, little air coming in under the door, not even enough height to it to stand up in. They shut the door and shut out even the sound, and they left him there, alone in the dark, alone with the fetid smell of whoever was in there last. He beat his hands against the wall, and he sagged, but he did not scream and he did not wail and he did not cry. He did not even hurt. He just got angrier.

He thought about Heath in that iron box. He thought about Keno Nash and how Keno thought about him when he was in the punishment hole at San Quentin, wanting to kill him, blaming him for putting him there. He thought about every human being who had ever made him angry in life, from the kids at school who tried to beat up on him or his little brother Nick to the men who had tried to kill him over the years to keep him from putting them in a place like this, or because he had already done it. The time went by – he didn't know how long – and his anger grew and grew until –

It exploded in the image of his mother in front of him, her words – _you're throwing away everything you ever stood for as a man and as a lawyer, the things Beth loved you for and married you for!_

Alone in the dark, in the stinking heat, in the misery of losing control over his own body functions because too much time was going by, he remembered his mother, her face, her desperation. He lashed out at it and would have torn her face apart, but of course, it wasn't really there.

He sagged. He closed his eyes. He did not weep and he did not scream. He just gave in and was silent and still.

He didn't know how long he'd been in there when the door opened and two men reached in to haul him out. He couldn't stand up at first, his legs too weak and his back too cramped, but in a few steps he grew straighter and a little stronger. They cleaned him up. They fed him. They gave him a clean, even smaller uniform, and they took him back to his cell.

His cellmates were there, watching him as the guards put him inside. He hardly had the strength to crawl up into his bunk. Lionel ended up giving him a boost. Jarrod said, "Thanks," in a voice that barely came out, it had been so long since he'd uttered a word. As he collapsed into his bed, he asked, "How long?"

"Two days," Pool said.

"It seemed longer," Jarrod sa

"It always does," Lionel said.

"You got a letter there," Simms said.

Jarrod saw that his feet had landed on an envelope. He reached down, picked it up, and saw Audra's handwriting. This would be the sixth letter he'd received since Nick and Heath had been to see him. He hadn't written back. He opened it and turned to face the wall, and he read.

_Dear Jarrod,_

_ It's been six months now. I don't know if it snows there in Nevada, but winter is coming on and the boys are bringing the herd down from the summer range. So far we haven't had any cold spells, and we've gotten all the summer fruit and vegetables put up for the winter. The crops were good this year. The wildflowers that grow behind the barn were especially lovely this year – _

Jarrod stopped reading. He didn't want to hear how wonderful everything was. He wanted to hear something, anything, that would make him even angrier so that he could get over the punishment hole and get rid of the vision of ripping his mother's face off and the other ghosts that followed him out of there. Instead of reading, he thought about the war, about the battles that tore men apart in front of him, about his own wounds that left him laid up more than once in fear of losing his life or a limb. He thought about how he wanted to take hold of anyone in a gray or butternut uniform and tear the limbs off of them, and he thought about the freezing rains while they were in winter quarters and the boredom and the marching and everything that tore his soul out. He got angrier and angrier and he started to crumple the letter up to throw it against the wall.

But as he crumpled it, he saw the last of it, his sister's words – _I love you, Jarrod. I'm counting the days until you're home with us again. _

He kept the letter. He couldn't read it again yet, but he didn't crumple it up. He held it in his hand, and he closed his eyes, and he slept.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

A day came when Jarrod was on road repair crew, out beyond the walls. It was not unusual for him to be sent on such a crew or even on the crew building the new reservoir and water supply facilities. They even had him making shoes now and then in a shoe factory they had going. But what was unusual on this day on the road crew was who he saw riding up the road, who they all moved out of the way for. Three men on horseback – two of them Nick and Heath, the third a local rancher Jarrod recognized that his brothers must have been here to do business with.

Embarrassed, Jarrod turned his back as they went by. He heard them slow, but he didn't look around. He hoped they wouldn't recognize him if he didn't look around, and soon they moved on and the crew got back into the road to repair it. Jarrod watched his brothers ride away. If they recognized him, they didn't look back.

_Freedom, sweet freedom_, he thought for the first time since he'd been here. _To ride a horse again, to go where I want to go again, to ride with my brothers again and work for my family again._

_To not be ashamed of my brothers seeing me._

A guard gave him an attention-getting whack on the back with his stick that hurt and nearly knocked him down. "Back to work."

Jarrod turned away from his brothers on the road and dug into work again, but as he lay in his bunk that night, he remembered the next day was visitors' day. Would Nick and Heath come to see him again? He was torn – did he want them to see him like this again? But then, what if they didn't come? Could he stand the disappointment, knowing they were so close and did not come?

He didn't sleep much. He needn't have worried. Come morning, he was summoned to the visitors' room, and there they were, Nick and Heath. Again, they looked at him like they were looking at a ghost, but this time Jarrod didn't let the antagonism or the embarrassment take him over. "It's good to see you," he said as he sat down with them. "I mean it this time."

It made them both smile. "How are you doing?" Nick asked.

Jarrod nodded. "Hanging in here. I think I might look a little better – been working hard and putting some muscle on. No 'lily white hands' anymore." He willingly showed them his worn, calloused hands and torn nails.

It hurt them to see them, but they kept smiling anyway. "You're almost halfway through now, you know," Heath said.

"I didn't know," Jarrod said. "I haven't been keeping track. How are Mother and Audra?"

"They want to come, but we thought we'd better see how you were first, and see if you want them to come."

Jarrod nodded. "I do want to see them. It's way past time, I know. So, you boys are in town on business?"

"Checking out horses," Nick said.

Jarrod decided to admit it. "I know. I saw you with Bob Carter yesterday. I was on that road crew you passed."

"We know," Heath admitted. "We saw you, but we figured you wouldn't like us seeing you, so we just rode on."

"Just as well," Jarrod said. He took a deep breath. "I've started to get my head back together more. I've started thinking about what I'm going to do when I get out here."

"You're gonna come home," Nick said flatly. "If you don't, we're gonna come after you and drag you back."

Jarrod chuckled, but felt as lifted as he'd felt since he'd been put away here. "I can't be a lawyer anymore."

"You can work the ranch just like we do," Nick said.

"And you've still got the business head," Heath said.

"You'll have to fill me in on the changes around the place," Jarrod said. "We're not a family who stands still."

There was something in Jarrod's including himself in the family in that brief sentence that sent Nick smiling even more. "We'll have a little board meeting before you're released and let you know where everything stands, right before you come home."

Jarrod smiled. "I'll look forward to it. My horse, Jingo – "

"He's being ridden. He's fine."

"Well, then," Jarrod said. "Everybody's as fine as we can be under the circumstances, I guess. Tell Mother and Audra I'll be happy to see them, but remind them I can't give a hug or a kiss. No touching allowed in here. They're afraid you'll give me a weapon or a file or something."

"Will they have you out working today?" Heath asked.

Jarrod nodded. "Every day. Once a week we get the morning off in case we have visitors, but hardly anyone gets any. My cellmates never do."

"How are you getting along with them?"

"All right. I lose two of them before the end of the year. They're being released, though I don't know where they'll go. No family for any of them." That thought made Jarrod give a little sigh, and he said, "I've treated you all so poorly, from the moment Beth was killed, and yet you still want me as part of the family." He caught a sob before it got out. He couldn't do any of that anywhere around here. "I am sorry for what I've done to you. Please make sure Mother and Audra know that too. Remorse has come too slowly, but it's coming."

"We know what an up and down trip this is you're taking, Jarrod," Heath said. "Just know you're not alone."

"We're here," Nick said. "We're always here."

Jarrod nodded. He knew they meant it. He wasn't sure he deserved it, and he wasn't sure he wasn't capable of squandering their love again. He knew he wasn't the man he thought he was only a year and half ago, and he knew he never would be again. The question was, what kind of man would he be when he got out of here? Would the budding remorse stay and grow, or would he turn sour again? If he turned, could he turn back? He left all of those questions unasked. "Thanks," he said instead. "I'll try to remember that every day."

XXXXXXXX

Jarrod actually counted the days until the next visitors' day, because he hoped his mother and sister would come. As the day grew closer, he grew more and more excited, and anxious. What would it be like, to see them next to him but be unable to hold them or kiss them? How would they react to see the wreck he'd become? He took some solace in the fact he was a bit more muscular than he had been, from working hard, but he was still too thin and his hair and beard still looked like some four-your-old had taken dull scissors to it. He would not look even like the wreck of a man they kissed good-bye in the courtroom a year and a half ago.

And he wouldn't be that man, either. Jarrod still wasn't sure who he had turned into. He didn't think he was the bitter, murderous man they had seen the last time they were with him, but he wasn't the man who had brought his wife home to the ranch, either. He wasn't the man who had built a legal career and a business career. He wasn't the steadfast defender of the downtrodden. He was just another convict now, just another inmate in the prison system, just another man who would someday be released but always carry the label of "ex-convict."

When they came to tell him he had visitors, he actually began to tremble. When he noticed his cellmates staring at him, he gave a sheepish grin and said, "It's my mother."

His cellmates actually laughed, understanding.

Jarrod went to the visitors' room, sucked his courage in and entered. And there they were, seated at a table among all the other tables and all the other visitors. They immediately stood up and looked like they were going to burst into tears. A year and a half it had been since they'd seen each other. A year and a half of him living in hell and dear God, the changes they had to be looking at. Jarrod could see the shock and the grief in their eyes, even if they did smile.

It tore him up. It broke his heart to see what he'd done to them and he felt like the worst vermin that ever crawled on the face of the earth, but on the other hand, they were so beautiful to behold, as lovely as springtime, everything he remembered. Everything of love and happiness he remembered. He smiled, and he rejoiced to see them again.

Victoria reached for him instinctively. "Jarrod – "

He shook his head. "Can't touch, Mother, I'm sorry. I can't even hold your chair out for you, but sit down, please."

They sat. Jarrod smiled at his sister. "I am so glad you've come. I've been so grateful for your letters."

"I hope they've helped," Audra said.

"Immeasurably," Jarrod said.

"How are you, darling?" Victoria asked.

"As you see me," Jarrod said. "A bit thinner, not very well groomed, but upright and taking – well, I'd say I was taking nourishment but the food around here is just subsistence level. Not really very nourishing."

"They won't even let us bring you anything to eat."

"I know, Mother. Don't worry about it. The important thing now is that I obey all the rules and get out of here on time."

"Nineteen months," Audra said.

"I haven't been counting, so I'll take your word for it."

"Is there anything we can do for you, Jarrod?" Victoria asked.

"Well, they keep me pretty busy around here," he said. "Gardening in the morning, rockpile or roadwork or other labor in the afternoon, laundry or kitchen in the evening. I'd ask you to send me a book, but there's no time to read one. No, Mother, there's really nothing you can do except keep the letters coming. Even when I don't write back, I treasure your words."

Victoria looked down at her hands and said, "There's something I have to tell you, Jarrod. We got word this morning from Fred Madden. He got word last night. Cass Hyatt is dead."

Jarrod didn't think he'd heard right. "Dead?"

Victoria nodded. "In prison yesterday, from pneumonia."

Jarrod leaned back in his chair, trying to decide what that meant to him. He wasn't sure. Something deep inside was sorry he hadn't done the deed himself, and that upset him. He hadn't thought about Hyatt or killing him anytime recently but now to hear that he was dead – Jarrod felt cheated. Jarrod felt anger rising up.

"Jarrod, let it go," Victoria said, seeing the flame come up in his eyes. "The man is gone. He's paid the price you would have had him pay."

Jarrod almost said _but I didn't get to extract it from him_, but he didn't. Not that he didn't feel that way – he did. But his mother and sister didn't need to hear it.

"Jarrod – " Victoria tried to get his attention.

Jarrod realized he had pulled inside himself. "I'm sorry. It's a bit of a shock."

"It's over, Jarrod," Audra said.

"It'll be over when I get out of here," Jarrod said.

"You're halfway through," Victoria said, and unthinking, she reached toward his hand.

The guard came down on her. "Hands to yourself."

Jarrod glared.


	9. Chapter 9

-Chapter 9

There was nothing in the guard's manner but bullying. Jarrod nearly came up out of his chair, but he forced himself to stay down and just said, "This is my mother. Treat her with some respect."

"I wasn't thinking," Victoria said quickly.

"Watch yourself," the guard said and backed off.

Jarrod's fiery eyes followed him. Victoria saw the trouble in there. "Let it go, Jarrod. I just made a mistake."

Jarrod broke his glare off, took a deep breath and smiled. They chatted idly, but awkwardly, for several more minutes before Jarrod said, "I need to be getting ready to go to work. Is there any other news for me? Did Nick and Heath buy any horses while they were over here?"

"Three mares," Audra said, trying to sound light.

Jarrod nodded. "They promised to meet with me before I'm released, so I can get some idea of what's been going on in my absence. I know I can't be a lawyer anymore, but I can help with the business end of things, and I can still ride a horse and work a herd."

Victoria smiled. "You know there's always a place for you in the family. Please don't ever doubt that."

"I don't," Jarrod said. "Will you come again once or twice while I'm still in here?"

Victoria nodded.

"Then I'll be fine," Jarrod said. "Give Nick and Heath my best, and tell Silas I'm really looking forward to his good cooking again."

Victoria nodded again. "Just take care of yourself, darling. We love you."

Jarrod swallowed the knot out of his throat. "I love you, too."

Jarrod stood up and let the guard take him out, feeling their eyes watching him go. And as soon as he was out of their presence, he began to seethe. He wasn't sure if it was finding out Hyatt was dead, or whether it was because of the way the guard had treated his mother, but his anger was rising up again. He didn't want that. He didn't want to get into trouble. But it was rolling over him as if the only thing that mattered right now was how unjust life was.

His cellmates noticed. "Didn't go well with Mama?" Simms asked.

Jarrod glared. "My mother is fine. It's the guard whose head I want on a plate."

"Nasty to your mother, right?"

"Right," Jarrod said after thinking about whether to agree or not.

"Just their way of keeping you in line, you know that," Lionel said.

"Yeah," Jarrod said.

He barely got the word out before the guards came to take them for the noon meal. After that, it would be work on the road crew again, and tonight he was to be back in the laundry. He didn't want the food but ate it anyway. He did what he was supposed to do on the road crew and watched his behavior, but he seethed anyway. He ate dinner and worked the laundry and continued to seethe and couldn't stop it now. It was growing and growing and by morning, after a sleepless night, he was ready to blow up.

And he did, when someone tripped over him while he was working in the garden. He lost it. He jumped up and kicked the man while he was down, then kicked him again, yelling, "Watch where you're going!" Men started to gather and the guards were right there, too, and before he knew it, Jarrod was back in the punishment hole. They threw him in and closed the door, and again the darkness and the silence and the heat he had never intended to put up with again were right there with him.

And he kicked himself. He swore at the injustice his mother had to endure and he swore at the man who tripped over him, but mostly he swore at himself for getting himself thrown in here again. There were no tears and no fear inside him. He just settled down against the wall, closed his eyes, and tried breathing his rage away. It was tough, breathing in nothing but the foul odor of whoever had been here before him and soon, of himself. Sitting in filth and not being able to even get up out of it. But he kept trying to master his rage. He was going to make it through this again, and he was never, ever coming back.

XXXXXXX

Brutal silence. Tormenting darkness. Sleeping and then not sleeping, awakened by the godawful smell and the feeling of sitting in his own filth. The heat beginning to build and the torment of watching that guard abuse his mother, of knowing that Cass Hyatt was dead but not by his hand, of knowing that Beth was gone – and it was his fault.

His fault. If he had never married her and brought her home, she'd be in Denver now, teaching school. If he had just not married her and said he'd come back for her, Cass Hyatt would have come and gone and Mr. and Mrs. Jarrod Barkley would be living happily ever after by now. He didn't admit to himself that he'd be dead by Hyatt's hand if Beth hadn't taken the bullet in front of him. That's just not what would have happened. And even if it had, she'd be alive now, not in the grave.

Guilt washed over him and it took a while to wring it out, but he had nothing but time in the punishment hole. Nothing to do but think his way into painful things and think his way out of them again. His legs cramped up. His stomach churned and he threw up lousy food and then acid when his stomach was empty. The lack of food made his blood sugar plummet and he started to think crazy thoughts, like he was really home in his own bed, like he was ready to go to court and try another case, like his fishing rod and Snyder's Creek were waiting for him on a Sunday afternoon. Like his shoes were snakes –

He scrambled, he cried out, but there was no one to hear him. He kept thinking his way through the fog of his mind and his situation. He knew where he was and that it was all his fault. He had deserted everything he ever stood for. He had deserted the law and justice and now he was paying for it, in this prison, in this punishment hole, in his own filth. He had earned every bit of suffering he was going through.

He said, out loud, "I'm sorry. Whoever is hearing me, I'm sorry. I let everyone down. I let myself down. I let Beth down. I'm sorry."

No one heard.

He was asleep when the door opened and light poured in to wake him. He was grabbed and pulled out even before he was awake enough to move. His legs cramped up and he couldn't walk. He couldn't even stand. The guards prodded him anyway, and he struggled like an 80-year-old man who had suffered a stroke. When they got him out of his clothes and into a fast shower, even the shower didn't loosen him up.

_It's your fault_, he told himself. _Take your punishment. Take it all. Just don't let it come down on anyone else again. It's yours. Take it._

His legs were still cramping when he was shoved back into his cell. He didn't even realize that by now, night was coming on. He stood swaying in the center of the room before Lionel and Pool got him pushed up into his bunk. "How long this time?" he asked.

"Three days," Lionel said. "They really got mad at you."

"They give you one or two times in the hole before they start making your time in there longer," Simms said. "You go in there again, it'll be four days, maybe more."

"I'm not going in there again," Jarrod said, half mumbling into his arm. "Not one more day."

His cellmates looked at each other. They had heard that song before. Each one of them had even sung it at some point.

"Go to sleep, Barkley," Lionel said and went back to his bunk. "It's back to business as usual tomorrow."

XXXXXX

If there was one thing about himself, about the old himself, that Jarrod knew in his heart was still true, it was that once he made up his mind about something, it was made up. He was immovable, relentless, determined, and nothing was going to change that. There was a comfort in that knowledge now, a confirmation that he hadn't lost everything he had been before Rimfire. Some of the man he thought he was was still there, solid and true. When he woke up in the morning and started a new day, he knew his Barkley stubbornness would still serve him, and this time he really was going to use it well.

He would toe the line. He would curb his anger whenever it flared up. He would do whatever he needed to do to stay out of that punishment hole, even if it was to stare down someone who crossed him rather than kick the man or punch him out. Even if he had to simply stand and take what a guard was dishing out, he'd stand and take it. He would not be goaded or bullied or shamed back into that punishment hole. It simply would not happen.

He went through his days as smoothly as he could. Work in the prison garden in the morning, breaking rock or building road or even fixing the walls of the prison in the afternoon, laundry or kitchen in the evening. He did what he needed to do, and he kept to himself. If someone tripped him or crossed him, he kept his temper to himself. He made it work.

He didn't know how long it was but Nick and Heath returned to visit. They filled him in on the Barkley business ventures and how they were going. They even asked his advice on a couple things, and Jarrod freely gave it. Victoria and Audra visited again as well, and then sometime later Nick and Heath came again. Time began to move along more quickly.

Simms and Pool were released before too many more months went by, and Jarrod and Lionel got two new cellmates, men named Tompkins and Walsh. Both were very young men, making Jarrod the old man of the group. He didn't put himself in the Pappy role here, though, except for one thing that came up very quickly. Walsh did not like negroes.

Lionel had learned early on in life that he'd better be ready to put up with a lot from white men in general, so he wasn't surprised that Walsh tended to shove him around literally and treat him like a servant from the moment Walsh was shoved through the door. Jarrod let it go at first, but it got to be too much when Walsh purposely tripped Lionel and Lionel went head first into the edge of a bunk.


	10. Chapter 10

-Chapter 10

When Walsh tripped Lionel, for a moment Jarrod forgot his resolution to avoid the confrontations that got him sent to the punishment hole. He slipped down out of his bunk and checked quickly to make sure Lionel wasn't badly hurt Luckily he wasn't Jarrod put himself directly into Walsh's face. The young man was not quite as tall as Jarrod but he still hadn't lost the weight he came in with, so he could have beaten Jarrod to a pulp if he wanted to, but Jarrod said, "Hit me or touch Lionel again and you'll get your first trip to the punishment hole."

"You don't scare me," Walsh said.

"That punishment hole will," Jarrod said. "Dark, silent, full of whatever filth is leftover from who came before you and hotter than the hinges of hell, and they'll leave you there for days with no food or water. And then you'll sit there in your own filth and drive yourself crazy with the ghosts who keep riding into your face. Wake up to where you are, boy. They don't take you out behind the barn for a whipping here. You watch yourself and you leave the rest of us alone, or I'll rat on you so fast you won't know it happened until you're sitting in your own piss."

Walsh backed off. He mostly kept to himself after that and didn't try to be friendly with anyone. He was there scarcely a week before he got into a fight in the garden area anyway and ended up in the punishment hole.

He came back to the cell after 24 hours, humbled and scared. Jarrod gave him a good hard glare right in the face, just to put the seal on the lesson.

XXXXXXX

The winter came on again. The cold seeped in right through the stone walls. Jarrod got letters from Audra apologizing that they hadn't come to see him, but the snows were heavy in the mountains this year and train travel was undependable. Jarrod knew too that winter brought on extra work for everyone and fewer hours of daylight to finish it in. He wrote back that he understood.

This year when spring came, the second anniversaries stuck him in the heart a little less than the first ones had. Again, he didn't know exactly which days were which, but he chose a day to think of as his wedding anniversary, and he lay in the dark after lights out just staring at the blackness over his head. Beth's face had continued to haunt him, but over time it was becoming less harsh, less accusatory, more like the soft loveliness he remembered. And oh, what he was able to remember this year. The train trip from Denver to Stockton that they took as man and wife. The wonderful lovemaking in a train that rocked back and forth and made the experience even more pleasurable. Beth's eyes as she took in the views of the mountains and the salt flats for the first time.

Oh, he missed her so much, but at least this year, the memories didn't hurt like they did last year. This year, he could even smile at the darkness and he fell asleep and dreamed peacefully, feeling her beside him, even if she wasn't really there.

Two years of his sentence went by. One more year to go. One more year and he'd be out of here and on his way home, back to a life worth living. Jarrod began to start thinking about what that life would be now, now that he could no longer be a lawyer, but more important, now that he was no longer the man he thought he was before. Who was he going to be now that he had been to prison, now that he had experienced the punishment hole and the regimentation of prison life? And even more – now that he had almost committed a cold-blooded murder and would have but for his brothers saving him – the brothers he would go back to and live with?

He was overcome with shame just to think about them. How would they look at him once he was out of prison? If they were living and working with each other every day, how would he deal with it knowing what they saw every time they looked at him? Jarrod didn't remember much about their showdown in Rimfire, but he remembered Nick's eyes when he pulled his gun on him. He remembered firm, no-nonsense, this-ends-here eyes. He remembered how appalled he was with himself when he realized he had just pulled his gun on his kid brother, the brother he promised God he would always take care of the day Nick was born. He had not only let him down. He had nearly intentionally killed him.

The shame was too much. Jarrod couldn't think about it anymore. This was going to take time, this figuring out who this next Jarrod Barkley was going to be when he got out of this place. Jarrod sucked his courage in one more time. He remembered that piece of him he still retained from before Rimfire – that piece of a man who was immovable, relentless and determined. That piece of him that was pure Barkley stubbornness.

He would figure it out. Over his last year in this place, he would figure out who Jarrod Barkley was going to be now.

XXXXXXX

A spider got into the corner above the head of Jarrod's bunk and built a web. Spiders and other insects were common around here, but Jarrod knew this one was going to have to go. It was too close to where he slept, and when a spider bit you, you could end up with the spot blowing up to twice its size and hurting and itching like crazy. Jarrod grabbed one of his shoes from where he left them at the bottom of his bunk and was just about to let the little monster have it when he noticed the spider wasn't alone.

It was dark in that corner and tough to see, but something of the light caught the web. It was beautiful, delicate and lovely in its way, but part of it was damaged and it was easy to see why. This tiny spider web-owner had caught something, something bigger than itself. A lot bigger than itself, and it was dragging it upward to where it was planning to cover it with web for some future dinner.

A LOT bigger, at least five times bigger than itself, and that tiny spider kept dragging it upward, against gravity, up and up. Jarrod watched, mesmerized, thinking, _that's kinda like me, isn't it? Dragging my salvation, something much bigger than I am, dragging it ever uphill._

It kept him frozen for long moments, seeing himself so graphically in front of him, watching that little thing dragging and dragging its dinner, or the nest egg for its offspring. Fighting the gravity. Ignoring everything but its struggle to survive. Up and up, by tiny spider steps, but always up, always up to whatever its goal was. _If you can do it, I can do it_, Jarrod thought.

But the thinking and imagining had to quit. The guards were coming and he'd have to get up and turn to his own struggle. And to be sure he'd never be bitten by this particular spider, Jarrod had to take his shoe and kill it. And he did.

XXXXXXX

Jarrod tolerated his new cellmates. After the trip to the punishment hole, Walsh had calmed down for a while, but there came another trip about a month after the first one, and Tompkins got his own trip about a week after that for throwing his sledgehammer at a guard. Tompkins was gone for several days for that stupidity. When he came back, he was barely a shell of a man. They didn't even have him work for a day.

Jarrod kept right on sticking to his plan. Work, keep to himself, stay out of trouble. Keep pulling that salvation uphill until he could bind it together and carry it out of this place when he finally left for good. Jarrod still got along fine with Lionel, and the two of them presented a front to Walsh when they had to. Tompkins never did side with anyone. He just watched and stayed to himself, hardly ever saying a word, especially when he came back from the punishment hole.

Then one morning, the guards rousted them out of bed and they all got up – all of them except Lionel.

Jarrod gave Lionel a shake. "Come on, Lionel, get up," he said.

But he knew right away Lionel wasn't going to get up. He was stone cold. He had died some time ago.

The world began to spin. Jarrod could barely keep his balance. He just couldn't believe this. How - ?

Walsh.

Jarrod lost it and grabbed Walsh by the shirt, pulling him into his face. "He's dead! He's dead! Why did you kill him?!"

"I didn't kill nobody!" the boy protested, pushing Jarrod away. "I swear, I didn't kill nobody!"

A guard heard the ruckus and came over, banging his stick against the bars. "What's going on?"

Jarrod looked at him. "Lionel is dead!"

Other guards came. They took Jarrod, Walsh and Tompkins out of the cell and marched them off for the morning meal with the others, but two guards stayed behind. Jarrod looked over his shoulder as they moved away from the cell, heartbroken. Lionel was a good man. Lionel had been the closest thing he had to a friend in this god forsaken hell. They had been together for two years now, two years of suffering that were supposed to end for Lionel in only two more weeks. He was supposed to be released in two weeks! Walsh knew that.

Jarrod glared at Walsh all the way to the food line, and behind him in line, Jarrod leaned toward him and whispered in his ear. "You killed Lionel, and they're gonna find you just as dead some morning. If you want to keep on living for more than a few more days, you better tell those guards you did it and get them to get you out of my cell, because I'm not gonna let you see the end of the week."

Jarrod cursed himself for doing this - it made him Walsh's target - but it was done, and he also felt a deep, ugly satisfaction for doing it. He'd made the threat and he knew that relentlessness he was using to forge his new self had turned on him now. Just as he had killed that spider, he was now killing his own salvation. This Jarrod Barkley was the one who had hunted down Cass Hyatt and nearly killed him, nearly killed his brothers. This was the inner monster Jarrod never knew he had and swore he'd never find again, but now here he was again. If Walsh had killed Lionel, Jarrod was going to kill him, quietly in the dark. He cursed himself for it, but he was going to be glad to do it.

Walsh suddenly wheeled and shoved his plate into Jarrod's face. Jarrod dropped his, wiped the food out of his eyes and immediately went for Walsh's throat.


	11. Chapter 11

**Chapter 11**

He had the man down before anyone could stop him, and he was strangling the life out of him. Guards tried to pull him off, but Jarrod wouldn't let go. The other inmates watched as the guards tore at Jarrod and tore at him and finally got him away and up.

They threw Jarrod back into the punishment hole again. His rage and anger kept up, kept him wide awake, kept him roaring mad. He had no idea what was happening with Walsh and Tompkins but as he thought about it he figured they were being questioned and not very gently, and his time was going to come, too. He was livid. He was murderous again. He was exactly who he did not want to be again, but the rage had him and it wasn't going to let him go.

He didn't know how long he'd been in there this time, but it was long enough to spend time in his own filth, although not enough time for his anger to ease even one little bit. When they took him out, showered him and gave him a clean uniform, he felt this time like he had not even been in the punishment hole at all. His fury was rolling so hard over everything else inside of him that he never suffered anything at all in the punishment hole, and never even worried about getting out of it. They could have left him there forever, for all he cared. He'd feed on his anger and his rage and his desire to kill Walsh as long as it took until he could get to Walsh.

They took him out eventually and back to his cell and only Tompkins was there. They pushed Jarrod inside, locked him up and went away. "How long was I gone?" Jarrod asked.

"Just a day," Tompkins said. "They been grilling me and Walsh about Lionel ever since you been gone. I know he killed Lionel and you know he killed Lionel, but it took a while for them to break him. Guard told me. Walsh admitted he killed Lionel. Smothered him during the night. Stupid kid just didn't like n-s. They took him away somewhere."

The punishment hole, or solitary, or something like that, Jarrod figured. But over the next few hours, he relaxed. The very old Jarrod inside him who treasured justice heaved a big sigh, because this time, justice was being done. The monster inside him that only wanted revenge slipped into the deepest interior again and was silent.

By the next morning, Jarrod felt centered again, calm, secure. He had not let the monster take over for good. Granted, that damned punishment hole kept him from it, but he knew he had kept himself from it, too, or he'd have murdered Walsh outright the moment he found Lionel dead. But he didn't do that. He waited and maybe the monster took him over for a few minutes in the food line and for a day in the punishment hole, but it was gone now, suppressed by justice happening in the last place Jarrod thought it would.

But Jarrod the convict ached. Lionel was still dead. Lionel, in here only because of a nearly empty keg of beer, Lionel who had never hurt anyone in his life, Lionel who just had the misfortune of being born black. Jarrod mourned him. He thought he would be the only one in the world who did.

But Tompkins said, "Lionel was all right. He didn't deserve what he got. Walsh ought to hang."

Jarrod was surprised to hear Tompkins say that, but gratified.

The morning did not go normally, though. Neither Jarrod nor Tompkins was sent out to work. They took them both out for more questioning, separately. This time Jarrod was taken to a room where a man in a three-piece suit just like the ones he used to wear questioned him. Adelson, the man said his name was. He was a DA in Carson City, not the one from Jarrod's case two years earlier, but he knew who Jarrod was and all about why he was in here. "I talked to my boss about you," Adelson explained.

Jarrod was sitting. Adelson was standing over him. Jarrod didn't plan to say a thing unless he was asked a question.

Adelson said, "Your cellmate Walsh has confessed to killing the negro."

Jarrod broke his plan right away. "His name was Lionel. He was in here for stealing a nearly empty keg of beer. He was to be released in two weeks."

Adelson didn't respond to that. "Walsh just doesn't like negroes."

Jarrod said nothing to that.

"That's no reason to kill a man, but it was reason enough to Walsh," Adelson said. "And I've been getting the impression it was reason enough for you to hate Walsh."

Jarrod glared now. "If there's a point to this discussion, why don't you get to it?"

Adelson said, "Walsh won't be coming back to your cell. I just need to ask you a few questions to close this case out. You're a lawyer. You know how it works."

Jarrod waited for the questions.

Adelson said, "Tell me what happened that morning."

Jarrod said, "I woke up. I got up. Lionel wasn't moving so I shook him, and he was cold. I knew he was dead. I knew Walsh killed him."

"And you threatened Walsh."

Jarrod nodded. "I told him he'd better confess."

"Or you'd kill him."

Jarrod didn't answer that.

"And then you tried to kill him."

Jarrod looked up at the man. "He came at me first," Jarrod said.

Adelson digressed. "You don't have any problem with negroes, do you?"

Jarrod considered his answer very carefully. He could make it short and just say no, or he could explain more fully. Something in him said he'd better get more across to this DA than just "no." "I commanded a company of colored soldiers during the war. They fought as well as any white man and died every bit as hard. I took them into battle at the Salt Works in Virginia, and they fought well despite the fact they knew the Confederates might just out and out execute them on sight. Two of my men risked their lives to get me off the field when I was wounded, because they knew the Confederates might execute me on sight for commanding them. No, I don't have any problem with negroes. I do have a problem with white men who have problems with negroes for no reason."

Adelson gave a small nod. Then he looked at Jarrod. "You have two reputations. Once Jarrod Barkley was a respected attorney with a spotless record for honesty and integrity. He could be counted on to be fair and forthright and everything a man of our profession should be. Now, Jarrod Barkley is an inmate in the Nevada State Prison for assault, disbarred for bribing an elected official, in trouble more than once on the inside and in the punishment hole more than once."

Jarrod said, "Get to the point again, Mr. Prosecutor."

Adelson's voice suddenly softened a bit. "Just this. You have less than a year to go in here. You've got decisions to make – which Jarrod Barkley is going to come out of here – the man of integrity, or the man who nearly murdered another one?"

"You're not telling me anything I don't know," Jarrod said.

"I don't care how provoked you were when you found the negro dead."

"Lionel," Jarrod said quickly.

"Lionel," Adelson agreed to. "You'd better walk the straight and narrow from now until the day you die, or even if you do get out of here, you might find yourself right back in someday."

"You're not telling me anything I don't know," Jarrod said again.

Adelson eased up even more. "I want life to work out for you, Mr. Barkley."

Jarrod flinched at that. No one had called him "Mister" Barkley for years. The unfamiliarity of it startled him.

"You've done a lot to destroy yourself," Adelson said. "You did it to get thrown in here, and you've done more since you got here. It's got to stop if you're gonna lead the life you ought to lead."

Jarrod resented the lecture, but then a picture suddenly flashed into his mind. A tiny spider in the corner of his cell, struggling to get an insect five times its size into its web. A spider Jarrod admired and thought he felt an affinity for and then just killed before it could bite him and make him sick.

Was that spider really a vision of himself grappling with his salvation, or was it a warning – that he had to kill a dark self that was dangerous to him, before it could make him sick – sicker than he already was? That dark self had some appeal sometimes. Sometimes it felt just damned good to be that angry, to threaten and to try to kill. He had wanted to kill Walsh. He had wanted to kill Hyatt. He knew he still wanted to kill them, and he knew that deep inside there was that monster who still liked the feeling.

Adelson said, "I just want things to work out for you, Mr. Barkley."

Jarrod saw sincerity in the man's eyes. Understanding? Probably not. Only a man who had let the monster out and come to know how gratifying it was to let him out could understand.

But what he saw in Adelson and heard in his words was an understanding of sorts. Not that Adelson understood him, but that Adelson knew he was capable of understanding himself, even now. And thinking about it over the next weeks, Jarrod did let himself understand. _That's not who I want to be. I don't want to like the monster. I don't want to be the monster. I don't care how much usefulness I think he has – he has none. He has only the power and the usefulness I let him think he has. I'm not going to let him have it anymore._


	12. Chapter 12

**-Chapter 12**

The next two cellmates who came in with Jarrod and Tompkins were both white men, both younger than Jarrod. As the monster retreated and shrunk inside him, it was beginning to disturb Jarrod to see the youth of the men coming in here. He was not an old man himself, but he was much older than these kids coming in now. How can kids so young go so wrong?

Without thinking about it, Jarrod was beginning to be "Pappy" again, acting as if he had to be a role model for these boys. Maybe it was just that better part of him coming forward as the date of his release drew closer. Maybe it was Adelson's lecture. Maybe it was a dead spider in the corner of his cell. Jarrod didn't know, but something of that very old Jarrod who existed before Rimfire, who loved and won Beth, who struggled for justice every waking hour of his life, was taking hold of him again. For one more time he was coming to his senses. It was becoming more and more important to toe the line, to be less of an animal in this horrid place and not more of one.

Jarrod went for months without seeing the punishment hole. He went for months without doing more than glaring at some inmate who crossed him or stumbled into him accidentally. He kicked no one, he punched no one, he even kept any cross word that might have come to him inside, not spoken. And gradually, the cross words didn't even come to him.

Nick and Heath came to visit one visitors' day. This time they had papers with them. Jarrod wondered what they were about.

"Just notes," Nick said as they sat down together. "Remember? We told you we'd get you back into what's going on with the businesses when it got closer to time you'd be released."

Jarrod suddenly realized he had no idea what date it was, what season it was, how far away his release date was.

Heath saw the confusion. "It's November," he said. "You'll be getting out in April – five more months. But winter's coming on. We don't know how hard it's gonna be to get over the mountains, so we figured we better give you some idea of what's been going on now."

"We can do it one more time before you get released, if the weather holds," Nick said.

Jarrod nodded. Nick started reading from his notes, about property and businesses the Barkleys had accumulated since Jarrod had been in here. About the size of the herds of cattle and horses and the expected transactions over the next few months. About the expansion of orchards and vineyards. About everything they'd be up to in his absence.

Jarrod nodded a lot, understanding, and actually feeling more connected now to the concept of being on the outside again. Hearing about what was going on was reawakening the businessman in him, and even some of the lawyer. "You're still seeing Cramer for legal help?" he asked when Nick was finished reading off his notes.

"Yeah," Nick said. "I know you can't technically do legal work after you get out, but you can advise us like you used to. Maybe you can't put your name on the contracts as an attorney but you can help us put them together."

"And you can still keep the outside businesses going," Heath said.

Jarrod's eyes twinkled. "And ride herd and dig fence posts?"

They weren't sure whether the twinkle was delight or sadness. Nick said, "We'll figure out your place, Jarrod. You just have to figure out you before you get home."

Jarrod understood what Nick was saying. They hadn't talked much about what happened at Rimfire and right before, or about what he had become since he'd been in here, but now Nick and Heath wanted to talk about it. They had to know who was coming home.

"I'm working on it, Nick," Jarrod said. "You're not gonna get the Jarrod Barkley you knew before all this happened, but you're not gonna get the Jarrod Barkley who shoved a gun in your face and threatened to kill you, either. I'm killing him."

"Maybe you ought not kill him completely, Jarrod," Heath said. "He has lessons to teach you."

"But he can't have me anymore, Heath," Jarrod said. "I'm not gonna let him have me anymore."

Nick leaned back in his chair and proceeded to be the blunt Nick he often was. "Have you been in the punishment hole lately?"

Jarrod shook his head. "Not for months. I haven't hit anybody or tripped anybody or kicked anybody or looked at a guard sideways."

"No trouble in any way?" Nick asked.

Now Jarrod was beginning to feel shamed, a lousy feeling especially when it was being handed to him by his younger brother – but maybe that wasn't a bad thing. And Nick had earned the right in the street in Rimfire. "No trouble in any way," Jarrod said.

"You know, once you're out of here, you're still gonna have to work on keeping that temper of yours to yourself," Nick said.

Now, suddenly, Jarrod felt almost like laughing. "Look who's talking," he said, the twinkle back in his eye, genuinely playful now.

Heath turned his head away so Nick couldn't see him smirk. Even Nick had to laugh and look embarrassed. "All right, Pappy, you got a point."

Jarrod smiled warmly. It was the first time they had called him "Pappy" since before all this happened. It was good to hear. "I know you'll be there for me, Nick," he said. "We always did keep each other in line, didn't we? We'll do it again. I'll cooperate if you will."

"Boy howdy," Heath said. "Why do I got more concerns about Nick cooperating than about you?"

"Well, now," Jarrod said, feeling a bit of brotherly wickedness slipping in for the first time in so long it almost hurt, but it felt good, too. "How about you, Nick? How many knock-down, drag-outs have you gotten into in the past two years?"

"Nevermind," Nick said.

Jarrod laughed. It was good to laugh. It was good for Nick and Heath to see his eyes crinkle up the way they did when he laughed.

"Just five more months, Jarrod," Heath said. "Five more months and we'll have you home."

Jarrod nodded. "Count on it."

XXXXXXXX

But the course certainly wasn't smooth. How can the course in prison ever be smooth? You never knew what to expect, who to expect it from, or what direction it might come from. You could keep your head down and your nose clean, but there could be somebody wanting to dirty you up for reasons you didn't even know, or even kill you.

It happened two months before Jarrod's release date. The winter had been dark and cloudy for weeks. Working out there in the weather had dragged the soul out of many a man, but not Jarrod. Each day was another day closer to release. Each day was another day closer to putting this three-year hell behind him. Each day was another day he felt more prepared to go home, to go back out into the world, to take this remade Jarrod Barkley into society and do some good with him.

But someone behind him in the food line had other plans. Jarrod had gotten his food and was turning away to go sit down when he spotted it, in someone's hand, heading for his gut. Something shiny. Something sharp.

Jarrod dropped his plate and knocked the thing out of the man's hand, and in doing that he dropped the man into the food table and down partly under it, sending serving bowls and people flying. Jarrod looked down at the man sprawled on the floor. He didn't even know who he was. He didn't think he had ever seen him before.

But before he could get a better look, he was grabbed from behind by both arms and wrestled away by two guards. They dragged him off and he knew he was headed to the punishment hole again. So close, so close to getting out of here –

But he was thrown back in the punishment hole, back in the darkness and silence and urine and puke and everything vile. Jarrod screamed with frustration, but there was no one to hear. He cried his agony and his fear and was afraid they would tack on more time to his sentence this time, and this wasn't even his fault. All he did was defend himself from a weapon. He had never intended to deck whoever that was who tried to stab him, but no one would let him explain that. He couldn't sleep, and then he couldn't stay awake, and the time crawled by. He sank into his own filth and despair and was ready to tear apart whoever opened that door when it came time to come get him.

But someone opened the door to get him a lot sooner than he thought they would. At least it seemed sooner. It could have been a week, for all he really knew, but his blood sugar hadn't dropped so low he was hallucinating and he didn't feel as wet as he felt the last time he spent three days in here.

They took him out. They showered him and gave him a clean uniform – and then one of the guards gave him an explanation as he took him back to his cell. It hadn't been but one day he'd been in there. "We found what 7222 tried to stab you with – a sharpened spoon that skidded under the food table. I saw you knock it away, but when 7222 went down and we couldn't find a weapon, we had to lock you up."

No apology. No perfunctory "sorry" even. But an explanation, and a question. "Who's 7222?"

"I don't know his name," the guard said. And he shoved Jarrod into his cell. "Ask your buddy 3667 there."

Jarrod was locked in with his cellmates. They had all just come in from working outside. Mealtime would be soon. 3667 was one of the new cellmates, a kid named Ober. "Who tried to kill me?" Jarrod asked, fighting to keep from growling. He did not want to go back into the punishment hole.

"I don't know his name," Ober said, "but word is you prosecuted his father in California. Put him in prison. He said he recognized you from the trial. I didn't know you was a prosecutor."

Jarrod hadn't told anyone that. He remembered his original cellmates knew he was a defense lawyer, but he hadn't told Tompkins or anybody else he was locked in here with that he had been a prosecutor. He'd even managed to keep it hidden when that one man months ago whose name he couldn't remember recognized him. He kept it hidden for the simple reason that it might draw exactly what it drew – men wanting to kill him, either because he had prosecuted them or someone they knew. Or just because he was a prosecutor.

Jarrod just climbed up into his bunk and lay down. Now he was in trouble, and he knew it. Because everybody around him now knew he had been a prosecutor. Now he was a target.


	13. Chapter 13

-Chapter 13

Jarrod supposed he should have been grateful it hadn't come out before now. It was only by the grace of God it hadn't, he figured, but the grace period was over. Two more months he needed. Only two months. If he could just live for two more months….

Mealtime went uneventfully, this time, largely because the guards had eyes hard on him. Nobody was going to take a chance getting to him when the chances of getting caught doing it were so high. This time though his nerves and his spell in the punishment hole had left him sick to his stomach and his gut. He couldn't eat. He was going to be throwing it up if he did. He wasn't even sure he wasn't going to foul himself the minute he stood up. Being sick was adding to his nerves and making him feel sicker.

And what was he going to do now that so many knew he'd been a prosecutor? How was he going to stay alive for two more months in a prison full of criminals who hated prosecutors? The guards couldn't keep watch every moment. He'd be incredibly vulnerable when he slept. He had one best hope. He wrote his brothers. _Come see me now._ And he hoped the letter would get past the guards and out.

He wasn't aware that he had another, even if perverse, hope – the warden. The warden knew what was happening because guards were reporting it to him. He didn't want anybody in his prison murdered here, not another one so soon after Lionel. It would mean his job at least, maybe any hope for any job anywhere. He had a big fat wad of self-interest at heart.

He put Jarrod in solitary confinement.

Jarrod couldn't believe it when they locked him in there. At least it wasn't the punishment hole, but it was punishment, and it happened before Nick and Heath could get to him. Seven weeks now. Seven weeks and he should be out of here, but would he be? He didn't know why he was here. He suspected it might be for his protection, and actually, at first he did feel safer in a way, but on the other hand solitary was solitary. Not only was he locked away from human contact. He was stuck if anyone actually got in here. He was stuck if some corrupt guard got money from somebody to kill him. He was trapped with no help and no way to get away if he had to.

It nearly did him in. His sickness from the punishment hole dissipated in only a day or two, but now it only took that many days for him to start to shiver and spend his days and nights in loneliness and terror. Dear God in heaven, if only he had been able to see Nick and Heath. He'd have asked them to get to the man they bought horses from, Carter. The man had clout. Maybe he could get him out of this prison just a few weeks early. Just a few weeks. Maybe he could have done it. Or Adelson. Maybe if he just could have gotten word to the DA he'd talked to after Lionel was killed, Adelson who called him _Mister_ Barkley, Adelson who seemed to be pulling for him at least. Who else? Who else? Maybe even the judge who put him in here in the first place. Maybe him or even Sheriff Fain at Rimfire. Did he even still have his job after taking the bribe? If he did, maybe he could help. Dear God in heaven, there had to be some help.

At least there were facilities and a cot. He didn't have to sit in his own filth or sleep on a dirty floor, but every sound outside the door terrified him. Every time they brought food, every time they came to take the tray away, every voice from another cell sent him screaming inside. He couldn't scream out loud. He couldn't let anyone hear him. He had to keep listening. He had to keep ready in case someone came in that door to kill him.

XXXXXXXX

Nick and Heath came and were livid to find out they couldn't see their brother. "Why the hell not?" Nick screamed at the guards. "Where is he? Where's my brother? Where do you have him and why can't we see him? Tell me!"

Heath had to try to hold him back and sound calm, because no guard was going to deal with a man as out of control as Nick was. "Please," Heath said as calmly as he could muster. "Our brother wrote us and asked us to come right away. Where is he? Why can't we see him?"

"I want to see the warden," Nick said. "I want to see him right here, right now."

One of the guard's supervisors appeared. "What's going on?"

"These are 2909's brothers," the guard at the visitors' desk told him. "They want to see him or they want to see the warden."

"Where's our brother?" Nick asked, nearly red-faced now with rage.

The supervisor said, "Come with me."

The supervisor knew exactly where Jarrod was, but he wasn't about to explain it to this big man coming apart at the seams. He took Nick and Heath to another room, the room where Adelson had interviewed Jarrod, and he sat them down.

"Wait here," the supervisor said. "I'll talk to the warden."

The supervisor left them there. They both got up as soon as he left. Heath stood patiently inside the door while Nick prowled around like a caged lion. "If Jarrod's dead – " Nick started.

"Don't jump to conclusions," Heath said. "If Jarrod was dead, we'd have been told. Something's going on but I don't think it's that he's dead."

"Then where is he? Why are they hiding him away from us?"

"I don't know, Nick. I don't know. Maybe – I don't know, maybe he's gotten himself in the punishment hole again. I don't know what's going on." Heath was floundering now, too, trying to keep his temper and Nick's in check before they found themselves locked up too.

It was too long a wait. The minutes crawled by, and then finally the supervisor reappeared. "Come with me," he said.

He took Nick and Heath out, and soon they were in the warden's office. They were not alone. The supervisor and two other guards remained – protection for the warden, no doubt.

"I want answers," Nick said straight out, fighting to keep from yelling. "Where's Jarrod Barkley?"

"Solitary confinement," the warden said without equivocating.

"What?!"

"Calm down," the warden said. "It's for his protection. He hasn't done anything. It's just that the regular population has found out that he was once a prosecutor. I can't believe he kept it quiet this long, but a couple weeks ago somebody recognized him and tried to kill him."

Nick and Heath both flared up.

"He's all right, he wasn't hurt," the warden said quickly. "He was put in solitary for his own protection about a week ago. We wrote you, but the letter probably just hadn't gotten to you before you came here. He has six weeks until his release now. We can get him that far IF we keep him separated from the regular inmates."

"That's inhuman," Heath said. "Solitary confinement is worse punishment. You're gonna destroy him."

"We're keeping close tabs on him," the warden said. "Of course, he's upset, but he's adjusting. He's beginning to accept that he's safer there and that it's not going to last much longer."

"Release him early," Nick said. "Release him now and let us take him home."

"I can't do that without a court order," the warden said.

"Then GET ONE!" Nick yelled.

"Nick – " Heath warned him to be calm.

"I don't even have standing to ask," the warden said. "If you think you can get it, go get it. The minute I get a court order that he be released, I'll get him out the door."

"Can we at least see him?" Heath asked.

"No, I'm sorry," the warden said.

"Can you have somebody tell him we were here and we talked to you?" Heath tried again.

The warden nodded. "I'll see he's told."

Nick tore out the door, Heath right behind him. All the way down the hall, all the way to the front door of the prison, Nick kept muttering, "We'll get help, we'll get him out of there today, we'll get him on a train today and out of here today and I don't care what it's gonna take to do it."

"Who are we gonna talk to?" Heath asked.

"That judge who put him in here for starters," Nick said. "Right now!"


	14. Chapter 14

Chapter 14

Jarrod didn't know what day it was. He didn't know how long he'd been in solitary confinement, but he knew it had been too long. He knew why he was here – they told him it was for his own protection, but every minute he was here alone in this cell was torture. Every minute was fear someone would get at him. He sucked in every bit of Barkley stubbornness, every bit of old determined Jarrod Barkley, every bit of anger and strength and whatever would work to keep him going that he could muster. He kept surviving. He kept living.

The supervisor of the guards came and talking to him through the door told him, "Your brothers were here."

Jarrod's soul rushed up inside him. "My brothers? When? Are they still here?"

"Today," the supervisor said. "They're not here now. They left. They just wanted you to know they were here."

Jarrod sat himself down on the bunk, stupefied and terrified. They were here, but they were gone. They left. They were gone. Dear God in heaven, they were gone. He never got to see them. They were gone and he never got to see them. Jarrod started to shake badly and couldn't stop. They were gone. His brothers were gone. His hope was gone. He was alone in here, and his hope was gone.

"Jarrod – "

He heard her voice. What? "Beth?"

"Jarrod – "

He heard it again. He knew it couldn't be real, but there it was. Somehow he was hearing it. Maybe it was just another voice from another cell whose words he couldn't hear well enough to make out. Or maybe it was his blood sugar betraying him again – he wasn't eating very well even though, unlike the punishment hole, the food was regular here. But he heard her voice. He heard her voice.

"Jarrod – "

He cried. It couldn't really be her. Why couldn't it really be her? Why couldn't he go back three years and make this all come out different? Why couldn't he be on a train in her arms, in their bed, watching her delight at the sun coming up? Smelling the sweetness of her perfume? Touching the softness of her skin? Why? Why, dear God in heaven, had the past three years happened the way they did?

"Jarrod – "

He wept. He shook. He let the grief have him.

XXXXXXX

"I can't sign an order like that, not just on your say-so," the judge said to them.

Nick and Heath were lucky even to get in to see the judge, but he had remembered them from the hearing when Jarrod was sentenced. He remembered the family who was there to support the man, because frankly, families seldom came to support anybody in his courtroom. But what they were asking, he couldn't grant.

"Then what will it take?" Nick asked. "What do we need to get you to sign an order?"

"A motion from the DA, affidavits as to why he should be released early," the judge said. "It's not that I don't believe you or that his life is not in jeopardy, but it seems to me they have the situation in hand at the prison."

"They have it in hand by putting him in solitary confinement," Heath said. "That's gonna hurt him bad if it doesn't kill him outright."

"I can't make the law up myself," the judge said. "I have to have some testimony to back up an order to release him. Go see the DA. See if he'll help you."

They got directions to the DA's office, and it was just dumb luck that the only man in the place at the moment was Adelson. They explained who they were and what they wanted, and they begged. "I know you don't even know who my brother is, but we've got to move to save his life now," Nick said.

"Actually, I do know who he is," Adelson said. "One of his cellmates was murdered in his sleep. I interviewed your brother. I know who he is and I know his history, all of it."

"Then help us," Heath begged. "Help us get what we need to get him out of there before somebody kills him or he gets driven out of his mind. If you know his history, then you know he deserves help."

Adelson started thinking. "I'll go over to the prison and talk to the warden. Do you have a hotel room in town?"

"We'll get one," Nick said.

"Go to the Carson House," Adelson said. "I'll see how fast I can get something done and I'll come to you by the end of the day and let you know where we stand. I can't say we'll get your brother out today or tomorrow or even before his scheduled release date, but I'll try. I'll do the best I can."

They believed him and they left him to do his work, but that left them standing in the street, impotent, unable to do a damned thing now but wait.

"Do you think we ought to wire Mother?" Heath asked.

Nick shook his head. "Not yet. We oughtta spare her this. Especially if we can get Jarrod out of there today or tomorrow."

"It's a big if, Nick," Heath said, "but you're right."

"Let's get over to that hotel and get a room, and maybe a drink," Nick said. And he sighed and stared at the sky. "We're here, Pappy," he said. "We're here and we're doing the best we can."

"If the warden is true to his word, Jarrod knows that already, Nick," Heath said.

"It can't hurt to tell him ourselves," Nick said.

XXXXXXXX

Nick and Heath didn't know exactly what Adelson was doing. Jarrod didn't know that Adelson was even doing anything. Nick and Heath waited in silence in the hotel bar, drinking. Jarrod waited in silence in solitary confinement, staring at the wall, disappearing into himself and having to fight his way out again over and over, all in a matter of hours.

Beth had gone away. Her voice was gone. Her face wouldn't come to him anymore. Nothing was coming to him anymore. He couldn't even hear any terrifying noises outside his cell anymore. He couldn't hear anything, he couldn't hope anything. He could only wait. He didn't know if hours were passing or days were. How many more weeks? How many more days? How much had he already endured in this god-forsaken prison? He kept taking deep breaths. He kept trying to gather together that Barkley stubbornness, that old Jarrod Barkley determination and hold it inside. That part of Jarrod Barkley was still there, still there. He kept trying to believe that instead of running out of time, he was about to regain it. He was closer and closer to that door opening and them coming to take him out of here and back into the world and home. Home. Blessed, blessed home.

He kept trying to believe, but he was afraid too, more afraid than he'd been since he got here. What if someone got to him like Walsh got to Lionel, when he was so close to getting out - so close - so close -

The door opened. He jumped. Two guards appeared. Jarrod crammed himself into a corner, crammed his courage into his faltering soul, and prepared to defend his life.

XXXXXXXX

Nick looked at his watch. It was just past five thirty. Six hours ago now since they had talked to the warden. Five since they saw the judge, and just a bit less than that since they saw Adelson. Nick closed his watch and sighed and shivered.

Heath saw and said, "Why don't we go clean up and get some dinner? We need to eat."

"Yeah," Nick said.

They went back up to the room they were sharing. It had its own wc, and Nick used it first while Heath just looked out the window, down at the street. Down at all the people living ordinary lives while theirs was in complete turmoil. He was as scared as Nick was, but he had to be solid about all this or Nick would have nobody to hold him together. He had to keep believing that they were going to work this out, that Jarrod was going to come out of that prison alive and at least a piece of the man they knew and loved, not done in by the terror of the years and of his past. He had to believe that, because he loved his oldest brother with everything in him. It was Jarrod who handed him the cigar at Sample's farm, Jarrod who had defended him in court more than once, Jarrod who had consistently helped anyone he could until that horrible day when no one could help him. Heath felt his eyes tear up and sting, and the people in the street became blurs he couldn't see anymore.

Nick came out of the wc. Heath heard him and wiped his eyes. Turning away from the window, he asked, "You through in there?"

"Yeah," Nick said.

And then there was a knock on the door. Closer to it, Nick looked at Heath with a mixture of hope and panic, and then opened the door.

They were there, two of them. Adelson in his three-piece suit, every bit the attorney at law. And Jarrod.

Jarrod, in his prison release suit, unshaven and shaggy haired and scarcely standing, but smiling.

"Jarrod – " Nick said.

Heath came running as Jarrod came in the door, and in a moment the three of them were in each other's arms. There was no laughter, only tears, tears of grief for the years that had gone by, tears of relief that they were actually, finally over. Tears that they could actually touch each other and hold each other and Jarrod was free, free as the wind, free and alive and if not completely well, at least closer to it than he'd been six hours ago. Jarrod kept saying, "Thank you, thank you.."

Nick took his older brother's face in his hands and just cried. "Aw, Jarrod – Jarrod – "

Heath saw Adelson standing at the door, just watching, smiling a little. Heath let go of his brothers and went to Adelson, extending a hand. "Thank you, man," he said. "God bless you."

Adelson nodded. "Best of luck," he said, and he left the Barkley brothers alone, alone and all of them free.


	15. Chapter 15

Chapter 15

Jarrod wasn't ready to be seen in public before he had spent some time at a tonsorial parlor and gotten a haircut, a shave, and a decent bath. That took a couple hours, but by eight o'clock that evening, he looked like himself again – a skinny self, maybe still in a prison suit, but a much better self than he had looked like in years. He saw himself in the mirror. He liked what he saw. He saw Jarrod Barkley again.

They took him for food and a glass of good scotch, and then they went back to the hotel, where he collapsed as soon as they came in the door. They had wanted to get him his own room, but thought better of it. Being alone was not what he needed. They had two single beds and put him in one of them. They took off his shoes and his jacket and otherwise left him in that prison suit.

"We'll get him better clothes tomorrow," Heath said.

"And then go home," Nick said.

"Should we wire Mother tonight and let her know he's out?"

Nick thought about it and shook his head. "She wouldn't get the wire before tomorrow anyway. Why don't we just show up with Jarrod there with us?" He smiled at the thought.

Heath agreed and nodded.

Nick asked, "You want the bathroom first?"

Heath turned with another nod and headed that way.

Nick sat down in a chair by the bed Jarrod was in as Heath went through the bathroom door. He was reminded of the watch they kept over Jarrod at the beginning of all this, when he collapsed in Rimfire, when Sheriff Fain chained him to the bed. So long ago now, but like yesterday at the same time. Those three years had crawled by and yet they had gone by. They were over, blessedly over. Now – no chains. No chains, ever again. This time, Jarrod was sleeping with a smile on his face, and when Heath came out of the bathroom, he found that Nick had fallen asleep that way too, in the chair.

XXXXXXX

Some new clothes, a train trip west, and not 24 hours later, Nick, Heath and Jarrod were riding up together to the Barkley mansion. Jarrod was on strange rented horse, but he knew this first time on horseback again would have felt strange even if it were his old friend Jingo. His legs and his butt were not used to a saddle, but he didn't care at all as he climbed down and gave the horse off to a stable hand he didn't recognize. He cared only that he was looking at the house he'd grown up in, somewhere he was afraid at times that he'd never see again. But here it was, that beautiful mansion his father had built when he was a kid, charged with keeping little Nick out of the way so he wouldn't get hurt while they watched the workman raise those great columns and set that big oak door on the front. Jarrod stood still for a while, looking, letting it settle in.

Nick and Heath had told him to be ready for a surprise welcome, because they hadn't told their mother and sister he'd be with them. Now, suddenly, Jarrod was nervous about it. Not about whether he'd be received well or not. Just nervous that he'd feel so overwhelmed he'd fall apart as soon as he saw them.

"Don't sweat it, Big Brother," Nick told him. "It'll be fine."

Nick was the first up to the door, and as soon as he opened it, he let out a big bellow that made Jarrod smile. "Mother?!"

"Oh, Nick, just once couldn't you – " She came in from the library, Audra right behind her, both of them anxious to find out why Jarrod had sent for his brothers. She wasn't even looking at first, but then she looked. For a moment she was stunned. For a moment she didn't even know who she was looking at.

And then his blue eyes sparkled. "Hello, Mother," he said.

"Jarrod – " she whispered. And then there was an explosion of joy like she'd never known before. "Jarrod! Oh, Jarrod!"

She ran to his arms, and he held her close. Audra came only a hair more slowly, and for a long time they just stood there in the foyer, holding each other, never letting go, their faces and their tears buried in each other's arms.

Nick and Heath both had to turn away. It was almost too much to take. Nick went to the refreshment table and poured a drink, Heath right behind him, and still Jarrod, Victoria and Audra just stood in the foyer holding each other.

"Oh, Jarrod," Victoria breathed one more time.

Nick raised his glass to Heath's. What more was there to say?

Except from Heath, a very quiet, "Welcome home, Big Brother," that only Nick heard.

XXXXXXX

Epilogue

After the tears, after Jarrod shared a joyous greeting with Silas and enjoyed his wonderful cooking, and then long after the sun went down, Victoria thought Jarrod had gone up to bed with everyone else, but as she made her way to her own room, she saw his door open and he wasn't in there. A bit alarmed, she hurried downstairs – where was he? He couldn't have gone – why would he have gone? Where would he have gone? But he hadn't gone. He was standing outside the French door from the living room to the verandah, which stood wide open behind him. He was staring up at the sky, not even smoking a cigar or drinking a scotch. Just standing and staring.

Victoria came to him quietly, saying softly, "Jarrod?" as she came near the door. She didn't want to startle him. She didn't know but thought it might be too easy to startle him now, given everything he'd gone through over the last three long years. But he didn't startle. He looked over his shoulder, and he opened his right arm to her. She came to his side and he put his arm around her before looking back up into the sky again.

"You know," he said, "I didn't get to see the sky last night in Carson City. Too cloudy. This is the first time I've seen the stars in three years. You were in by dark because they didn't want there to be any time you were out of your cell when they couldn't see you. This is the first time – " His voice closed.

She squeezed him.

"This is the first time I've seen Beth's star," Jarrod said. "The North star – right up there." He pointed. His voice closed again.

Victoria said, "I know. I've been watching it for you."

Jarrod's eyes filled with tears. "Mother, I am so sorry for what I've done to you."

"No, Jarrod, not now, not tonight – "

"No, I have to say it now, right now. My behavior that got me into all this was appalling. I tried to murder another human being. I bribed a sheriff. I took a gun to my own brother and after all that, you all stood by me anyway. I've shamed you beyond fixing. I've put you through a hell I can never make up to you and I don't believe I can even try, even though it's what I want more than anything in the world."

"Jarrod, what's done is done," Victoria said. "You've paid your debt."

"To society maybe," Jarrod said. "Not to you. I can never pay the debt I owe to you and everyone else - and to Beth."

She touched his face and put her hand gently to his mouth to quiet him. "You have a great deal of healing to do, Jarrod. We all do. But right now, don't regret anything. Don't fret over anything. You're home. We're a family again. We'll start off new tomorrow morning and maybe we can never forget what's happened, but we can keep it and use it and begin again."

Jarrod took her hand and kissed it. He knew he was not the man he thought he was three years ago. Maybe he never really was, but he knew everything that had happened, everything he had done and everything that had been done to him, had changed him too. He just wasn't sure how yet. His mother was right. There was a lot of healing to do, and he wasn't sure at all how it was going to go, but at least now, he was home with the family who had loved him and saved him. At least now the healing could start and he could find out who Jarrod Barkley really was, and maybe had been all along.

He looked back up at the stars again. "Stay here with me a little while. I don't want to stop looking just yet. It's amazing, what becomes so beautiful when you haven't been able to see it - and hold it - for so long." And he looked back at his mother with love that told her that she was what he was finding the most beautiful, that she was here with him in his arm and that was even more beautiful than the stars.

"I'll stay here as long as you need me," Victoria said. "I love you, darling."

Jarrod squeezed her. "I love you too, Mother."

And together they looked up at the stars for a very long time.

The End


End file.
